Seeing the wood 关注森林

Tropical forests
热带雨林

Seeing the wood
关注森林

Saving trees is one of the best ways of saving the environment
保护植被是保护环境的最佳途径之一

Aug 23rd 2014 | From the print edition


1 “FORESTS are the lungs of our land,” said Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Twenty years ago, the world’s lungs were diseased. Brazil, the country with more tropical trees than any other, was cutting down an area of forest two-thirds the size of Belgium every year. Roughly half of all the planet’s once-luxuriant tropical forests had been felled and the further degradation of the Earth’s green spaces seemed inevitable.

富兰克林.德拉诺.罗斯福（Franklin Delano Roosevelt）说过：“森林是大地之肺。”20年前，世界之肺染上了疾病。巴西是世界上热带雨林最多的国家，当时它每年砍伐的雨林面积相当于比利时国土面积的2/3。地球上曾经茂密的热带雨林近一半被砍伐，地球绿地的进一步退化似乎无可避免。

2 It would be too much to say that forests have made a full recovery. Worldwide, over 5m hectares of jungle—getting on for two Belgiums—are still being felled or burned down each year. In some countries, notably Indonesia, the chainsaws are growing louder. But the crisis is passing and the prognosis is starting to improve. Fears that the great forests of the Congo would be cleared have proved unfounded so far. Brazil and Mexico have reduced their deforestation rates by well over two-thirds. India and Costa Rica have done more than reduce the rate of loss: they are replanting areas that were once clear-cut.

如果说森林已经全面康复了，那就言过其实了。全球每年仍有500多万公顷（接近比利时面积的两倍）的丛林被砍伐或烧毁。在一些国家，特别是印度尼西亚，链锯声正在变得越来越响。但是危机正在过去，对未来形势的预断也开始变得更准确了。对于刚果丛林将会消失的忧虑目前看来是毫无根据的。巴西和墨西哥滥伐森林的速率降低了2/3多；印度和哥斯达黎加在减少森林消失速率方面更有作为：他们正在曾被夷为平地的林区重新植树。

3 Over time countries trace a “forest transition curve”. They start in poverty with the land covered in trees. As they get richer, they fell the forest and the curve plummets until it reaches a low point when people decide to protect whatever they have left. Then the curve rises as reforestation begins. At almost every point along the line, countries are now doing better: deforesters are chopping down less; reforesters are replanting more.

长期以来各国都遵循着“森林过渡曲线”。开始时国家贫穷，植被茂密；随着富裕程度提高，人们砍伐树林；曲线直降到一定低点人们才会开始保护森林——无论还剩下什么；之后曲线随着重新造林逐渐上扬。无论正处于曲线上哪一点，几乎所有国家的植被状况都在改善：滥伐国家砍伐的树木减少了，再造林国家种植的树木增多了。

4 This matters to everyone, including rich countries in temperate zones, because of the extraordinary contribution that tropical forests make to mitigating carbon emissions. Trees are carbon sinks. If you fell and burn them, you release carbon into the atmosphere. If you let them grow, they squirrel carbon away in their trunks for centuries. Despite decades of destruction, tropical forests are still absorbing about a fifth of emissions from fossil fuels each year.

这对所有人来说都至关重要，包括地处温带的富国，因为热带雨林对减少碳排放有突出的贡献。树木是碳吸收池。如果砍伐烧毁它们，碳会被释放到大气中；如果任其生长，树木能够将碳储存于树干中长达几世纪。尽管几十年来惨遭破坏，热带雨林每年仍能吸收约1/5的化石燃料排放物。

5 Encouraging countries to plant trees (or discouraging them from logging) is by far the most effective way of reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. If Brazil had kept on felling trees as rapidly as it was cutting them down in 2005, it would, by 2013, have put an extra 3.2 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. That means that over those eight years it managed to save six times as much carbon as ultra-green Germany did in the same period through one of the world’s most expensive renewable-energy regimes. As a way of helping the environment, protecting trees is hard to beat. It is in everyone’s interest to find out which forest policies work—and back them.

鼓励各国植树造林（或劝阻它们滥伐树木）是目前为止减少温室气体排放的最有效途径。如果巴西仍保持其2005年砍伐树木的速度，到2013年额外排入大气的二氧化碳量会达到32亿吨。这就意味着巴西在8年间成功减少的碳排放量是超级环保的德国在同期内通过世界上最昂贵的再生能源技术所达成的6倍。作为一种环保方式，保护树木是其他措施难以匹敌的。找出哪些森林政策卓有成效并支持这些政策符合所有人的利益。

The law in the jungle
丛林法则
6 As well as cleaner air, forests provide all sorts of benefits, such as clean water downstream. Alas, everyone is happy to enjoy the benefits but few are willing to pay for them (see article). So the most effective forest policies are usually top-down bans, such as on farming or logging.

除了净化空气，森林还能带来各种各样的益处，比如洁净的下游水。唉，所有人都热衷于享受福利但少有人愿意为此买单（另见文）。因此最有效的森林政策通常是自上而下的禁令，例如农耕禁令和伐木禁令。

7 Prohibitions by themselves, though, are not enough. Tropical forests tend to be remote places where the writ of the law does not run. But Brazil shows that bans can be made to stick if there is political support at the top and popular backing from below (the policies started to bite when President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took charge of them), and if there is an institutional network to back them up. In Brazil’s case, that meant everything from satellites to show the public what was happening in the Amazon to moratoriums on purchases of soyabeans and beef produced on cleared land.

不过禁令本身尚不足够，热带雨林所在地往往是法令无法触及的偏远地区。但是巴西的经验表明，如果上有政策支持、下有民众赞同（政策在总统Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva掌管后开始起效）、另有机构网络辅助，人民就会遵守禁令。巴西的情况就是全面行动，从告知民众亚马逊现状的卫星监控到暂停购买禁地生产的大豆和牛肉的规定，一应俱全。

8 Only forested countries themselves can provide leadership from the top. But outsiders can help. They could finance, say, new land registries. And they should fund an all-purpose UN programme to improve forest management in tropical countries called REDD+ (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation).

只有森林国家自身能够进行自上而下的领导，但是其他国家可以提供帮助，比如说资助新的地政局。它们还应该资助意在提高热带国家森林管控状况的万能联合国项目——该项目名为“减少滥伐树木和森林退化造成的排放”（简称REDD）。

9 Rich countries spend billions on renewable energy at home, which has so far cut carbon emissions only a bit. They should be willing to spend a few millions abroad, protecting tropical forests that reduce emissions a lot.

富国在国内耗资数十亿用于可再生能源以减少碳排放量，目前为止收效甚微。它们应该会愿意在国外花费几百万，以保护能够大大削减排放量的热带雨林。
remark: 它们还应该资助意在提高热带国家森林管控状况的万能联合国项目——该项目名为“减少滥伐树木和森林退化造成的排放”（简称REDD）。富国在国内耗资数十亿用于可再生能源以减少碳排放量，目前为止收效甚微。它们应该会愿意在国外花费几百万，以保护能够大大削减排放量的热带雨林。
不过禁令本身尚不足够，热带雨林所在地往往是法令无法触及的偏远地区。但是巴西的经验表明，如果上有政策支持、下有民众赞同、另有机构网络辅助，人民就会遵守禁令。巴西的情况就是全面行动，从告知民众亚马逊现状的卫星监控到暂停购买禁地生产的大豆和牛肉的规定，一应俱全
鼓励各国植树造林（或劝阻它们滥伐树木）是目前为止减少温室气体排放的最有效途径。如果巴西仍保持其2005年砍伐树木的速度，到2013年额外排入大气的二氧化碳量会达到32亿吨。这就意味着巴西在8年间成功减少的碳排放量是超级环保的德国在同期内通过世界上最昂贵的再生能源技术所达成的6倍
富兰克林.德拉诺.罗斯福（Franklin Delano Roosevelt）说过：“森林是大地之肺。”20年前，世界之肺染上了疾病。巴西是世界上热带雨林最多的国家，当时它每年砍伐的雨林面积相当于比利时国土面积的2/3。地球上曾经茂密的热带雨林近一半被砍伐，地球绿地的进一步退化似乎无可避免