PART C: ECOLOGICAL FORESTRY
For Helle and Claudia Janssen, forestry is a problem but also a solution.
They want to establish forests with permanent canopies - yet still harvest timber - to offset the ecological footprint of communities and industries such as radiata forestry, viticulture and aquaculture.
The couple set up Reciprocate Biocapacity as a registered charity in 2008, to raise money through Biocapacity Bonds to establish the permanent forests, agroforestry and parklands projects.
Unlike carbon credits, which focus only on sequestering carbon from the air, the Janssens’ scheme is a holistic approach that aims to return carbon to the soil, through forests of broadleaf and indigenous species, and to invigorate communities with local employment.
“There’s a whole raft of issues that need to be dealt with holistically and simultaneously and we don’t have the leisure to waste time, or the resources to address single issues,” says Helle, who has a Masters degree in forestry ecology and worked for eight years on policy advice in biodiversity and soil quality.
The Biocapacity project measures a person’s ecological footprint to determine their consumption rate and 1 he resources required to sustain their lifestyle. Each Biocapacity Bond costs $200, Which establishes 20 multipurpose trees, enough to offset carbon emissions associated with the lifestyle of an average consumer for half a year, while also “restoring biological capacity and useful resources that sustain local communities”, says Helle.
The money is given to “land guardians”, including community and council projects or private landowners, to establish sustainable forests where there will always be a permanent canopy, despite managed harvests.
“It’s all about leaving the best and taking out what is not so good, which is the opposite of the way things were done in the past.”
He says about 35 useful indigenous trees, plus dozens of compatible exotics, can be grown, with a focus on trees that, unlike radiata and eucalypt, do not propagate through fire.
“The purpose of a biocapacity forest is to have within 60 to 70 years at least 100 high-quality trees standing per hectare.”
Judges in the -Marlborough Environment Awards said the new idea was timely, in light of the hillside erosion after December’s storm. “With the increase in pine harvesting in the next 10 years in Marlborough, Reciprocate Biocapacity provides another more sustainable option for replanting.”
They said the Janssens’ holistic approach looked at the big picture “and the big opportunities for a different style of forestry”.
The couple, who moved to New Zealand from Germany in 1985, are passionate about their project and alarmed at communities sitting “like a possum in the headlights” while financial imperatives strip their natural resources.
“The environment is what sustains communities and at the moment everyone is out there for themselves against each other in competition for the buck that is never there.
“This is about co-operating responsibly and about communities recognising their worth and that they can only live longterm sustainably in a functioning environment.”
The Janssens’ website says it’s payback time: “We are all in arrears to compensate future generations for the greedy consumption of Earth’s natural resources and for squandering its energy.”
For the rest of this article, please go to:
SEEING FORESTS FOR MORE THAN THE TREES
PART A: THE INTER-GENERATIONAL BOUTIQUE FOREST
SEEING FORESTS FOR MORE THAN THE TREES
PART B: THE PICTURE PERFECT PINE PLANTATION
Original Article written by Sophie Preece
Published in Wild tomato Magazine.
