Climate Politics
Two Million People Are Demanding Payment for Forest Preservation
At COP27, the African country of Gabon will make the case that decades of conservation deserve compensation too.
Gabon is one of 13 remaining countries considered “high forest, low deforestation,” according to the World Bank.
Photographer: Amaury Hauchard/AFP/Getty Images
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Right now, countries and companies can get paid for all kinds of pollution-reducing initiatives, including lowering historic rates of deforestation or planting new trees. But what about the places that have protected their forests from the beginning?
They too are entitled to compensation, argues Gabon, a heavily forested central African nation of 2 million people that’s become a leading advocate of payment for preservation.