Carbon Balance of China-Made Wood Products Assessed Using a Trade-Linked Approach

Harvested wood products (HWPs) contribute to forestry carbon removal and, therefore, to climate change mitigation. However, the complex international trade of raw wood materials and HWPs and the associated biogenic carbon conversion along the global supply chain are not properly accounted for in the existing HWP carbon accounting schemes, precluding effective climate policy design. To address the gap, we developed a generalizable Trade-Linked Approach to account for trade and the associated carbon stocks and emissions. In the case study for China-made HWPs in 1990-2020, trade partners supplied 22% (1425 MtCO2e, or 389 MtC) of raw materials and consumed 13% (691 MtCO2e, or 189 MtC) of the HWPs, with the latter double that of the FAOSTAT statistics that were used in the existing studies. In the same period, the trade partners contributed 13% (570 MtCO2e) of the total HWP carbon stocks. The HWPs consumed overseas provided a 43 MtCO2e yr-1 carbon sink (15% of the total) from 2016 to 2020, which is close to the "forest and land use carbon credits" transacted in global voluntary carbon markets in 2020. In addition to adequately allocating carbon removals to each country, we appeal for a global HWP-associated carbon payment scheme to incentivize HWP-based mitigation activities along the supply chain.