COP26: Opinion at WL West & Sons

COP26 has hit the headlines in the past few weeks, and rightly so – our planet is in jeopardy from industrialisation, globalism and the need for land at the cost of forests. 196 world leaders, who are responsible for over 85% of the world’s forests (over 13million square miles), attended the Glasgow summit between 31 Oct 2021 – 12 Nov 2021.  The overall goals of COP26 were as follows, as stated on the COP26 official website:

It’s often said “The forests of the world are the lungs of the world.” The forests are key to adsorbing the methane and carbon dioxide produced, generally from fossil fuels. Unfortunately, it’s been announced within a press release by HM Government office that the rate of decline in forest cover is taking place at approx 27 football pitches per minute. The Amazon, for example, has lost 30% of its forest since 2001, and in 2020 it was a 12 year high for deforestation under the president Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.

At COP26, a historic moment was reached in agreeing to a plan of reforestation over the next ten years with the aim of reducing the decline of forest loss and therefore improving and capturing carbon in the main to lock it up –  the key aspect to this is to minimise global temperature rises. Simply put – as global temperature rise, more catastrophic weather patterns emerge, such as floods, droughts, and forest fires. You only need to look at recent weather news to see these weather patterns already taking place.

But should we celebrate? The world is aiming to keep the global temperature at an increase of 1.5 degree by 2050, however India is one country that cannot hope to offer on this till 2070. China appears to be in a similar position and has hinted that it will rethink its timetable to slash emissions. Further, of the 196 that attended COP26, 110 voted for reforestation – yet 85 abstained. This is a huge proportion of our leaders who do not seem to be on our wavelength. Scientists interviewed during COP26 suggest its more likely to be 3% increase by 2050, which is devastation for our children and grandchildren. This will in effect melt the polar ice caps.

Chris Packham, within a recent statement this week, suggested there is still no firm commitment on stopping the use of fossil fuel. He referred to the IPPC report, stating that “business is killing all of us and everything that lives on this planet“. The Paris Climate Summit in 2015, suggested if the global temperature rise was held below 1.5 degrees the planet could survive – this has been the benchmark throughout COP26, but it seems it’s unlikely not to be met.

During the 1990’s, China was opening a new coal fired power station most weeks and India was not far behind. The ever-increasing population growth infringes on forest areas. Forest clearance has been most notable from space. The Amazon rainforest, once the largest forest area, has been superseded by the Congo / West Africa. The need to farm for meat and soya has stripped the land of trees and because the soil is to thinly delicate, erosion has already started to occur making areas baron. Palm oil plantations have ruined tracks of jungle, which again has seen terrible landslides and erosion.

In summary – the COP26 delegation has agreed to stop forest destruction by 2030 and begin the reforestation programme. The main package was agreed as below:

• £5.3 billion by government contributed funds for re afforested areas
• £8.75 billion from public and private companies in
• The UK will contribute to the international fund £1.5 billion

Governments of 28 countries also committed to remove deforestation from the global trade of food and other agricultural products such as palm oil, soya and cocoa. More than 30 of the world’s biggest financial companies – including Aviva, Schroders and Axa – have also promised to end investment in activities linked to deforestation. A £1.1bn fund will be established to protect the world’s second largest tropical rainforest – in the Congo Basin.

 

Why is this so important to us?

So why does a small timber sawmill in West Sussex care about these global issues? It’s simple – without our supply base protected, we have no business.

Timber is our only natural renewable resource which offers so many wonderful bi-products, clean air brings just one – and a huge one at that. Modification on lifestyle and less smash and grab economics will leave the world in a better position for future generations.

This is so serious now,  but the solution could be simple. For approximately every one ton of timber growing, it takes out of the atmosphere approx 1.48 tons of carbon. It’s simple logic and we really must do more.

Boris Johnson was quoted “We have to stop the devastating loss of our forests,” he said – and “end the role of humanity as nature’s conqueror, and instead become nature’s custodian“.