£108m Scheme to Save Rainforest to Be Policed By Satellite

Britain and Norway created a £108m fund yesterday to help save the world's second largest rainforest, central Africa's Congo basin, with the help of satellite imaging technology. The fund is intended to provide African governments and people living in the rainforest with a viable alternative to logging and mining. The Congo rainforest is about twice the size of France but is dwindling at a rate equal to 25,000 football pitches a week.

Projects will be eligible for funds if they can demonstrate they can curb the destruction of forest, by providing alternative sources of income or energy, for example. Their effectiveness will be monitored from above by high-definition cameras, which are to be mounted on satellites and launched into space in the next two years.

"We are pledging to work together to secure the future of one of the world's last remaining ancient forests," the prime minister, Gordon Brown, said at the scheme's launch yesterday. Britain initiated the fund and is providing £58m. "Preserving our forests is vital if we are going to reduce global emissions."

Jens Stoltenberg, the Norwegian prime minister, whose government is putting £50m into the scheme over three years, as part of a broader £300m a year forest initiative, said the money spent was the most immediate and cost-effective way to combat greenhouse gas emissions. The estimated cost of reducing emissions through stopping deforestation is £3 a metric tonne of CO2, compared with £50-£100 a tonne for carbon capture schemes

British and Norwegian officials acknowledge that the biggest challenge will be ensuring that the money is effectively spent. The Congo rainforest sprawls across Cameroon, Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and Congo-Brazaville. Across large swaths, particularly in the DRC, corruption is rife, while mining and logging companies are prepared to offer large rewards to communities and regional authorities to open up their forests.