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Offsetting Benefits? Analyzing Access to Forest Carbon

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  • Esteve Corbera
  • Katrina Brown

Abstract

Emissions trading has created new forms of exchangeable property which become commodities when traded in markets designed to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions and mitigate climate change. This paper analyzes a set of social processes which influence who benefits from reductions in emissions generated by primary production from forest ecosystems. Informed by commodification literature, and property and access theory, we suggest that farmers and rural communities cannot derive full benefits from carbon sequestration because they lack key structural and relational mechanisms, such as capital, knowledge, expertise, technology, and, in some cases, even labour. We illustrate this argument by examining three ongoing carbon-forestry projects in China, Ecuador, and Mexico and we highlight its implications for future forestry mitigation projects and programmes.

Suggested Citation

  • Esteve Corbera & Katrina Brown, 2010. "Offsetting Benefits? Analyzing Access to Forest Carbon," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 42(7), pages 1739-1761, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:envira:v:42:y:2010:i:7:p:1739-1761
    DOI: 10.1068/a42437
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Patrick Bottazzi & David Crespo & Harry Soria & Hy Dao & Marcelo Serrudo & Jean Paul Benavides & Stefan Schwarzer & Stephan Rist, 2014. "Carbon Sequestration in Community Forests: Trade-offs, Multiple Outcomes and Institutional Diversity in the Bolivian Amazon," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 45(1), pages 105-131, January.
    2. Benjamin Neimark & Sango Mahanty & Wolfram Dressler, 2016. "Mapping Value in a ‘Green’ Commodity Frontier: Revisiting Commodity Chain Analysis," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 47(2), pages 240-265, March.
    3. Benjamin, Emmanuel O. & Ola, Oreoluwa & Buchenrieder, Gertrud, 2018. "Does an agroforestry scheme with payment for ecosystem services (PES) economically empower women in sub-Saharan Africa?," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 31(PA), pages 1-11.
    4. Sikor, Thomas & He, Jun & Lestrelin, Guillaume, 2017. "Property Rights Regimes and Natural Resources: A Conceptual Analysis Revisited," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 337-349.
    5. Watts, John D. & Tacconi, Luca & Irawan, Silvia & Wijaya, Aklan H., 2019. "Village transfers for the environment: Lessons from community-based development programs and the village fund," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 1-1.
    6. Oliver Taherzadeh & Peter Howley, 2018. "No net loss of what, for whom?: stakeholder perspectives to Biodiversity Offsetting in England," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 20(4), pages 1807-1830, August.
    7. David M. Lansing, 2014. "Unequal Access to Payments for Ecosystem Services: The Case of Costa Rica," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 45(6), pages 1310-1331, November.

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