FORESTS, FOOD AND LAND CAN DELIVER 30% OF SOLUTIONS NEEDED TO TACKLE CLIMATE CRISIS BY 2030

The way we use land for food, forestry, and other purposes contributes about 24%—or approximately 12 billion tons—of our total annual greenhouse gas emissions. That’s the second largest source of climate pollution after energy, according to the WWF International who chaired the Land Use Challenge Coalition at the recent Global Climate Action Summit.

In order to prevent some of the run-away effects of climate change, scientists have concluded that it is not enough to simply reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. We must change the way we farm, fish and manage forests to sequester carbon from our atmosphere. Emissions reductions from these land-based solutions are a necessary part of the solution if we are to tackle climate change and keep temperatures increases to under 2 degrees.

As part of the Global Climate Action Summit, WWF, together with a broad coalition of partners (EFM included!), issued the 30X30 Forests, Food and Land Challenge. Partners committed to achieving an ambitious goal of sequestering one gigaton of carbon per year in forests and other natural and working lands.