Lending academic weight to concerns that environmentalists have long voiced, Nophea Sasaki and Francis E. Putz note that current definitions fail to effectively account for degradation of forests, including industrial logging and conversion of natural forests to some types of plantations. The result: an international climate framework could ignore substantial emissions from forest degradation, a process that reduces forest carbon stock and other ecosystem services, increases the risk of fire, and diminishes biodiversity.
Over the past decade global tropical deforestation was estimated to result in 1.1–2.2 billion tons year. Forest degradation is thought to have resulted in similar emissions.
The UNFCCC defines "forest" as an area of 0.05-1 hectares in size with 10 to 30 percent covered by canopy consisting of trees that reach a height of at least 2-5 meters at maturity. The definition means that an old-growth rainforest can be heavily logged, with substantial amounts of timber (biomass) removed, without recognition of the loss of carbon. Green groups fear that this limitation could allow forestry companies to collect carbon payments while continuing to inflict heavy damage in forest areas.
To illustrate this case, Sasaki and Putz looked at inventory data for forest in central Cambodia.
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