Today at COP13 was Forest Day. I began the day inflating all three trees with the guys from TFG. Scott, Devorah and I followed it up with a much-needed quick swim in a super-luxurious pool, and then it was off to the Parallel Sessions at Forest Day. In Session 2, we listened to a panel of 3 present on “Drivers of deforestation and implications for incentive schemes.”
Giseline Cunha Zeri presented the findings of her paper Governance and Socio-economic drivers of deforestation, and really threw some new light (for me at least) on the common assumptions that population growth increases deforestation, and rising income reduces deforestation. As I had previously believed, and as her literature review showed, most papers supported these hypotheses. But she tested several…

