In a new development roughly 45 countries with tropical rainforests are proposing to cut their deforestation by a quarter in 5 years as part of a deal to be finalized next week at the Copenhagen climate conference.

That was the statement by Kevin Conrad, a negotiator with Papua New Guinea, at a press conference today. Behind closed doors negotiators are making headway towards an agreement that would for the first time put cutting deforestation under the U.N. climate treaty. But a number of key issues related to the U.N. Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries—also known as REDD—are still leading to acrimony...

Read the full story here on the Science magazine site: http://blogs.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2009/12/forests-deal-lu.html