The Central Highlands province of Lam Dong has been chosen as the only Vietnamese province participating in a UN project to reduce greenhouse gas caused by deforestation.

Deforestation is among reasons causing the increase of greenhouse gas.

This programme, called United Nations Collaborative Programme on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries (UN-REDD) is implemented in nine countries with Vietnam as the only South East Asian participant.

The project will run in two districts, Lac Duong and Lam Ha.

The Vietnamese Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development says that besides choosing Lam Dong for this project, the ministry has developed a framework programme to cope with climate change in agriculture and rural development between till 2020.

UN-REDD was introduced at the 11^th conference of member states of the UN Framework Convention of Climate Change held in Montreal, Canada in 2005. At the 13^th conference in Indonesia in 2007, participants approved the Bali Action Plan, which suggested turning REDD into an official body aimed specicially at curbing climate change.

The project implemented in Lam Dong is worth nearly $4.4 million and is funded by the Norwegian government.

According to the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, Lam Ha and Lac Duong have up to 214,900ha of forests, accounting for over 60 percent of total undeveloped land. However, forests in the two districts are shrinking.

Experts believe that the UN-REDD project will be effective tool to curb deforestation and boost efforts aimed at fighting climate change.

VietNamNet/LD