Mining for gold is the number one cause of deforestation in Guyana. But can these forests recover after the mines have been abandoned? New research shows that recovery is very limited in the first 5 years after abandonment, but some parts of the mine where top soils are piled up to grant access to gold deposits below the surface, can regenerate naturally. Read the full study led by Dr Michelle Kalamandeen here:
https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/1365-2664.13669
Almost 90 percent of Guyana’s roughly 750,000 residents live in coastal areas outside of the forests, which contributes to the preservation of the country’s intact forest landscape. Over the past two decades, deforestation rates in Guyana have ranged from between 0.02 percent to 0.079 percent – far less than many other tropical countries. The full article is available here…
Guyana’s “high forest cover – low deforestation status” signifies a high level for its contribution towards global efforts aimed at 1) reducing carbon emissions 2) containing the build-up of greenhouse gases and, 3) preventing global warming and climate change. Keeping Guyana’s forest cover intact therefore provides environmental services for the global community and, as a small poor developing country, it should be compensated for this contribution.
The highest resolution forest loss map to date is today published in the journal Science. The global map includes deforestation across the world including Guyana since 2000, at a resolution of 30m. The collaboration between the University of Maryland, NASA and Google Inc is the first of its kind, and the data will be freely available from January 2014.
See the interactive map here: http://earthenginepartners.appspot.com/science-2013-global-forest
Source: Hansen, M.C., Potapov, P.V., Moore, R., Hancher, M., Turubanova, S.A., Tyukavina, A., Thau, D., Stehman, S.V., Goetz, S.J., Loveland, T.R., Kommareddy, A., Egorov, A., Chini, L., Justice, C.O. & Townshend, J.R.G. (2013) High-resolution global maps of 21st-century forest cover change. Science, 342, 850-853.
How to balance logging, biodiversity and carbon sequestration.
The November 2013 issue of Discover Magazine features PhD student Jake Bicknell who has been working in the Iwokrama Forest on the impacts of forestry using reduced-impact logging.
Under the COBRA (Community Owned Best practice for sustainable Resource Adaptive management in the Guiana Shield, South America) project, communities of the North Rupununi have made a video highlighting the importance of their forests for their livelihoods. The film which was produced, written an edited by the community members demonstrates the excellent work of project COBRA.
Guyana says it will receive an additional $45 million in cash from Norway as a reward for protecting its Amazonian rainforest.
President Donald Ramotar says the money will help fund a hydroelectric project in central Guyana and provide electricity and Internet service in remote jungle communities.
The Guyana Forestry Commission (GFC) is pleased to release, the second performance report on Interim Measures for Reducing Emissions for Deforestation and Forest Degradation Plus (REDD+), under Guyana’s Monitoring Reporting and Verification System (MRVS).
A team from the Government of Guyana, headed by Shyam Nokta, Presidential Adviser and Head of the Office of Climate Change is currently in Suriname as part of collaboration between the two countries on climate change and REDD+. Neighbouring Suriname, like Guyana, is also formulating policies to counter the impact of climate change and has developed its own strategy to position the country to tap into REDD+ programs.
First of Its kind multimillion dollar trust fund launched to protect Guyana’s forests.
The governments of Guyana and Germany along with conservation international launch fund to protect critical ecosystems, maintain global carbon stocks and benefit local communities. Read more…
Guyana Conservation Network | GuyCoN 