Russia's forests play a crucial role in regulating the global climate system, but the economic potential of this natural resource has yet to be explored. We propose a mechanism for regulating foreign trade by implementing a car-bon tax on the export of roundwood and sawn wood that would serve both the goals of creating a funding source for climate mitigation initiatives in forestry and incentivizing deep wood processing. Our approach utilizes statistics on for-eign trade in wood products from 2016 to 2021, along with data on the transportation of these commodities, to assess the carbon balance of Russian regions. The findings indicate that the regions of Siberia, the Far East, and North-West of Russia play a predominant role in the export of low-processed wood. Applying a carbon unit price of 1,000 rubles per ton of CO2 and trade volumes at the 2021 level, we estimate potential payments for total emissions from the ex-port of roundwood and sawn wood at 65.7 billion rubles. The Irkutsk Oblast, Krasnoyarsk Krai and Khabarovsk Krai account for one third of this volume. The collected duties could be allocated to the development of initiatives focused on reforestation, afforestation and climate change mitigation in the Russian Federation. The proposed measure of state regulation of foreign trade in wood products can be regarded as a potential alternative to the existing customs duties on roundwood exports. It is consistent with the policy of stimulating high-value-added industries and, moreover, contributes to the achievement of national climate goals.
timber industry, climate projects in forestry, carbon balance, carbon tax, emission payments, Asian Russia, sawn wood
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