Charles Palmer (London School of Economics) on "Seeking additionality: an impact assessment of a pilot REDD+ project in Berbak National Park, Indonesia"

Tropical forests are being cleared rapidly, causing up to 20 percent of all anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions and critical biodiversity loss. Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD+) could help reduce deforestation and forest degradation (DD), thereby reducing these negative externalities. We assess the performance of one year of REDD+ pilot project activities in reducing deforestation in Berbak National Park in Sumatra, Indonesia. In 2009, a field base was built and occupied by forest police and research staff, who patrolled adjacent forest areas. L Band satellite Radar data (ALOS PALSAR) is used to estimate deforestation between 2007 and 2010, with the intervention hypothesised to reduce DD in the park. Naive comparison suggests DD increases inside Berbak following the intervention. Application of difference-in-difference, with two protected area controls, however, suggests that this increase is not statistically significant. Yet the DD trends observed in the control areas differed from Berbak and covariates could not be perfectly matched, which limits inference.