DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17792454
title: Pivoting forestry and agricultural concessions to conservation in Southeast Asia

description: Overview

This repository contains the per-concession economic analysis results, R scripts, and high-resolution map images supporting the paper "Pivoting forestry and agricultural concessions to conservation in Southeast Asia" (in review as of the date of this record's publication). The study evaluated the amount of natural forests remaining within industrial concessions and the economic viability of protecting these forests through avoided deforestation carbon projects. To accomplish the latter, it estimated the break-even carbon prices at which transitioning to forest protection can compete financially with forestry and agriculture.

The repository is divided into three folders.

1. PCCSEA_Gradients

These .csv files (also provided in .rds format) consist of the deforestation rates, forest aboveground carbon densities, forest area sizes, and gradients of the break-even carbon price formula computed for each concession examined. Data are grouped according to country (Indonesia, Malaysia, Cambodia, or Myanmar) and concession type (logging, oil palm, planted wood, or rubber).

Gradients are presented for all combinations of sensitivity scenarios tested. Multiplying the gradient by the annual project cost (USD / ha / year) will yield the break-even carbon price (USD per t CO2). Note that for this dataset, we only include concessions which have deforestation rates > 0. 

Interpretations of column names



FID, objectid, NAME, or similar: Identity tags associated with each concession, matching those in the attribute tables of the spatial concession datasets employed in this study.

ADR[baseline][years]: Annual baseline deforestation rates (% / year) calculated by applying the Puyravaud formula, using one of four deforestation baseline variants (conc: concession-specific, type: type-specific, jur: jurisdictional, nat: national), and for over a period of either 5 (2019 to 2024) or 10 (2014 to 2024) years of historical deforestation.

ACDmean: Mean aboveground carbon density (Mg C / ha) of natural tropical moist forest within the concession.

ACDse.ESS: Standard error of aboveground carbon density, propagated accounting for spatial autocorrelation.

Area_ha: Area of natural tropical moist forest within the concession, in hectares.

G[baseline][years]BC[buffer credit %]R[discount rate %]EI[effectiveness index %]: Gradient of the break-even carbon price formula calculated using a particular combination of parameters —



The baseline variant (conc: concession-specific, type: type-specific, jur: jurisdictional, nat: national)

Number of years of historical deforestation considered to build the baseline (5, 10)

The buffer credit % set aside to address potential non-permanence (10, 20, 30, 40)

The risk-adjusted discount rate % (5, 8, 10, 15)

The effectiveness index % weighting a project's success at avoiding deforestation (70, 80, 90, 100)



GU[baseline][years]BC[buffer credit %]R[discount rate %]EI[effectiveness index %]: Uncertainty associated with the gradient.


2. PCCSEA_Maps

High-resolution images showing the extent of natural forests in concessions that can competitively transition to protecting forests at varying carbon price tiers. Files follow the naming convention [concession type]_[baseline][stastical estimate]_PriceTiers.png, where the baseline variant is either concession-specific (conc) or jurisdictional (jur), and the statistical estimate used is the mean (M), lower-bound (LB), or upper-bound (UB) break-even carbon price.

3. PCCSEA_RScripts

PCCSEA_Script_S1.R covers the code used to determine the total areas of natural forests in concessions, their corresponding carbon stock, and their intersection with Key Biodiversity Areas. It also covers the calculation of annual deforestation rates for the different deforestation baseline variants.

PCCSEA_Script_S2.R covers the code used to obtain break-even carbon price gradients, derive annual project costs, plot break-even price curves, and estimate break-even carbon prices for individual concessions. It also covers the generation of forest extent rasters for the production of the carbon price tier maps.