As leaders pledge to protect forests, Gabon suggests how

GABON, A SMALL, family-run petrostate in west Africa, may seem a rather odd campaigner against global warming. Once Africa’s fifth-largest oil exporter, it profited from the world pumping more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Now, however, it hopes to benefit by helping the world to avoid overheating—and by encouraging rich countries to pay African ones to keep their forests standing. Its advocacy got a boost on November 2nd when the leaders of more than 100 countries pledged at the COP26 summit to end deforestation by 2030. To help that happen, rich countries promised to stump up billions of dollars.