D. BRADLEY 165 Issues in Forest Carbon Crediting Issues in Forest Carbon Crediting

While the Kyoto Protocol was primarily a greenhouse gas emissions reduction agreement, forest sequestration offsets were allowed for new forests, and Article 3.4 allowed for inclusion of offsets from existing forests and agricultural activities. Many forest management activities are documented in scientific papers as sequestering incremental carbon, including pest and disease control, thinning and tree improvement. Carbon trades have already occurred for reduced impact logging and reduced tillage. Several factors have prevented meaningful market activity. A lack of guidelines on forest carbon crediting and trading has forced buyers of carbon offsets to establish their own, hindering effective trading. There is confusion around the term “business as usual ” which is difficult to assess, is often meaningless, and leads to paradoxes. An effective way to account for carbon in plantations and other forestry activities is a methodology proposed by M. Kirschbaum et al, whereby carbon uptake is credited equally and annually over a period until the new long-term carbon storage level is reached. This method eliminates the problems associated with repeated buying and selling of credits over several rotations, and also reduces the need for costly annual measurements