WWF URGES YUDHOYONO TO PRESS FOR INCENTIVES

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono should push world leaders attending the G20 Summit in the United States for financial incentives from emissions cuts in the forestry sector, the WWF says.

The environmental NGO said the absence of concrete policies and financial incentives could discourage forest nations from tackling deforestation and forest degradation that contributed about 20 percent to global carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.

""With no clear financial support for REDD [reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation], itwill difficult for forest nations, including Indonesia, to cope with deforestation,"" Fitrian Ardiansyah, WWFs program director for climate and energy, told The Jakarta Post on Wednesday.

""President Yudhoyono needs to remind world leaders about the urgency of REDD in tackling climate change.""

REDD is an alternative mechanism to slash greenhouse gas emissions, the main cause of climate change.

Fitrian said forest nations were still awaiting concrete policies such as reliable financial support to be awarded to countries that implemented REDD.

Yudhoyono has left for Pittsburgh in the US to attend the Sept. 24-25 G20 Summit, and is slated to address the issue of climate change.

The G20 brings together industrial and emerging-market countries that represent 85 percent of global gross national product and two-thirds of the worlds population.

Members of the G20, including the United States, China and Indonesia, are among the biggest emitters of CO2, blamed for higher global temperatures and sea level rises.

Climate change threatens longer dry spells and smaller periods of rain but in larger volumes, increasing the risk of floods and landslides.

Indonesia, the worlds third-largest forest nation, with about 120 miW lion hectares of rainforest, suffers annual prolonged droughts that affect people and crops.(Adianto P. Simamora)