Market-based conservation schemes not measuring up

DEPENDING on your point of view, market-based conservation or the generation of carbon offset credits through preserving natural carbon sinks such as forests and peatlands either looks like a very good or a very bad idea. A recent large-scale study by the International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO), which drew on years of academic and field research across 120 countries, unfortunately tends to support the latter perspective.

For those who may be unfamiliar with the concept, the basic idea is that since lands such as forests and peatlands naturally remove a calculable amount of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, companies that are compelled or wish to "offset" their carbon emissions can purchase credits from the holders of these lands. The amount of carbon removed from the atmosphere per credit (they are usually denominated in metric tons of CO2) then cancels out the corresponding amount of carbon emitted by the company, with the money paid being used to maintain the land in its natural state or fund other carbon-mitigation projects such as tree-planting.