Criteria for effective zero-deforestation commitments
Criteria for effective zero-deforestation commitments
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DOI：
10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2018.11.003
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发表时间：
2019-01-01
影响因子：
8.9
通讯作者：
Villoria, N.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Garrett, R. D.;Levy, S.;Villoria, N.
零森林砍伐承诺是一种自愿的可持续性倡议，公司采用这种倡议来表明他们打算减少或消除与其生产、贸易和/或销售的商品相关的森林砍伐。由于每家公司都确定了自己的零森林砍伐承诺目标和执行机制，承诺内容差异很大。这给评估承诺的执行情况或效力带来了挑战。在这里，我们制定标准来评估零森林砍伐承诺在减少公司供应链、区域和全球森林砍伐方面的潜在有效性。我们应用这些标准来评估森林500强确定的具有高森林砍伐风险的公司所做出的52项零森林砍伐承诺。虽然我们的评估表明，现有承诺与若干有效性标准相一致，但在几个关键方面仍有不足。首先，它们只占全球毁林风险商品市场的一小部分，这意味着它们的全球影响可能很小。其次，仅在巴西亚马逊地区实现了生物群落范围的实施。在该地区以外，实施主要通过认证计划进行，这些计划并没有被所有生产者采用，也缺乏第三方近实时的森林砍伐监测。此外，所有承诺中约有一半包括零净毁林目标和未来的执行期限，这两者都是可能降低有效性的设计要素。零净目标允许承诺未来重新造林以补偿目前的森林损失，而未来的执行期限允许先发制人的清除。为了增加承诺导致所有规模的森林砍伐减少的可能性，更多的公司应该在森林转化为商品的风险高的生物群落中采用零总砍伐目标，立即执行最后期限和明确的基于制裁的执行机制。
Zero-deforestation commitments are a type of voluntary sustainability initiative that companies adopt to signal their intention to reduce or eliminate deforestation associated with commodities that they produce, trade, and/or sell. Because each company defines its own zero-deforestation commitment goals and implementation mechanisms, commitment content varies widely. This creates challenges for the assessment of commitment implementation or effectiveness. Here, we develop criteria to assess the potential effectiveness of zero-deforestation commitments at reducing deforestation within a company supply chain, regionally, and globally. We apply these criteria to evaluate 52 zero-deforestation commitments made by companies identified by Forest 500 as having high deforestation risk. While our assessment indicates that existing commitments converge with several criteria for effectiveness, they fall short in a few key ways. First, they cover just a small share of the global market for deforestation-risk commodities, which means that their global impact is likely to be small. Second, biome-wide implementation is only achieved in the Brazilian Amazon. Outside this region, implementation occurs mainly through certification programs, which are not adopted by all producers and lack third-party near-real time deforestation monitoring. Additionally, around half of all commitments include zero-net deforestation targets and future implementation deadlines, both of which are design elements that may reduce effectiveness. Zero-net targets allow promises of future reforestation to compensate for current forest loss, while future implementation deadlines allow for preemptive clearing. To increase the likelihood that commitments will lead to reduced deforestation across all scales, more companies should adopt zero-gross deforestation targets with immediate implementation deadlines and clear sanction-based implementation mechanisms in biomes with high risk of forest to commodity conversion.