Insight

Franz Tattenbach Presentation to Clinton Global Initiative

September 28, 2010
The Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) was established by former President Bill Clinton in 2005 to bring private sector, non-governmental organizations and other global leaders to help combat the world's most pressing problems and realize change. In 2007, Franz Tattenbach, while working as the Executive Director of FUNDACOR, gave a presentation at a CGI session on Energy & Climate Change: Protecting Tropical Forests. Tattenbach, as the member of a prestigious panel of speakers, discussed how FUNDACOR had assisted Costa Rica in setting up the world's first carbon offset deal in 1997 through a tax on fossil fuels. He notes that through the program, farmers were paid upwards of $US14 million a year to plant trees and maintain forests. Over a 10-year period under the program, forest cover rose from 27 per cent to about 50 per cent and carbon emissions remained static.