A SENIOR United Nations official feels forest conservation is the logical way for the world to go on the road to a new global climate change pact, and this fits neatly into Guyana ’s low carbon development thrust.

Pavan Sukhdev, a senior banker at Deutsche Bank currently on secondment with the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP), said finalising the UN’s forest conservation scheme is an obvious and critical step to agreeing the climate change agreement.

Sukhdev, an economist, advocates curbing deforestation as a priority.

This is in line with Guyana ’s draft Low Carbon Development Strategy (LCDS) model, which is undergoing a three-month national consultation process ahead of the presentation of the final model at the UN climate change summit in Copenhagen , Denmark in December.

“There should be a complete reversal of priorities, and countries should get on with what they can agree on, which is curbing deforestation,” Sukhdev told Reuters news agency.

With the fight against climate change assuming greater significance, Britain last week also announced that it will double the share of its electricity generated from low carbon sources by 2020, as part of plans to cut emissions and counter global warming.

It was the first country to set legally-binding emissions targets, and wants to cut its output of planet-warming gases by 34 per cent by 2020, from 1990 levels.

Energy and Climate Change Secretary, Ed Miliband said 40 per cent of Britain’s electricity will come from nuclear, wind, solar, marine and cleaner coal, compared with a fifth today.

By 2020, renewable energy sources will provide 31 per cent of Britain’s electricity, up from 6 per cent today, while nuclear’s share will fall to eight (8) per cent from current levels of between 15 per cent and nearly a quarter, depending on the variable output of nuclear plants.

“Our plan will strengthen our energy security…it seizes industrial opportunity, and it rises to the moral challenge of climate change,” Miliband said in a statement.

He said the pledge shows Britain’s commitment to the climate talks in Copenhagen that aim to secure a global deal to replace the Kyoto Protocol on reducing emissions.

Attempts to reach a new accord have foundered on fears that environmental targets could hamper any economic recovery, and rows between rich and developing nations on emissions cuts.

US President Barack Obama, who chaired the Major Economies Forum this month, failed to convince China , India and others to agree to a G8-supported goal of halving world emissions by 2050.

Guyana’s LCDS, at its core, seeks to foster greater economic development while maintaining the country’s standing forest as part of efforts towards addressing climate change.

Reduced emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD), the UN’s market-based forestry scheme, issues carbon credits as financial incentive to dissuade forest owners from logging.

The LCDS provides the framework into which REDD, Readiness Planning and other initiatives will fit.

Investment in low carbon economic infrastructure in Guyana includes the development of hydro-power to reduce reliance on petroleum-based fuels, the upgrading of sea defences to protect against current and future impacts of sea level rise, improved roads, drainage and irrigation to unused, non-forested lands such as the Canje Basin and the intermediate savannahs, and improved hi-tech telecommunications facilities to facilitate the development of low carbon businesses such as call centres.

Sukhdev said: “We should be rewarding countries that are reducing deforestation and improving their conservation practices; nobody disagrees with this.”

“I don’t see the mainstream climate negotiation carrying big stories other than frustration and more frustration,” he said, adding that 24 per cent of global carbon dioxide emissions and 18 per cent of all greenhouse gas emissions come from deforestation.

“With REDD, it’s sitting there staring at you, waiting for you to do the obvious,” he said.

REDD trial schemes are being run in developing countries like Cambodia, Indonesia and Brazil.

Distribution of REDD credit revenues still needs to be worked out, with the question addressed of how much cash will be invested in replanting in damaged or degraded areas.

Forest-rich governments should encourage developed nations to pledge some $20-30 billion per year to their REDD strategies, then create a fund to allocate the money to the best projects, Sukhdev said.

“More money, then, will come from the private sector, but getting started is the problem,” he added.

Some countries are already making progress in saving their forests through REDD, even if the plan’s details remain unclear.

Norway last year pledged $1 billion through 2015 to Brazil’s Amazon rainforest protection fund, and has agreed to help finance Guyana’s model.

Once money has been pledged, a forest fund is established, and profit-sharing rules are in place, the creation of a marketplace buoyed by tight national emissions caps is key to driving REDD credit demand, Sukhdev said.

“The market will work with good, strong caps in a post-2012 agreement,” he added.

“The welfare benefits from protected forests are already upwards of $4-5 trillion, twice the size of the global car industry, and yet its employment is a tiny fraction of the car industry.”