A Brief History of REDD + Regional REDD+ Coordination Unit Tigray Regional State,Mekelle Sep 3 & 4/2015 MINISTRY OF ENVIRONMENT AND FOREST NATIONAL REDD+ SECRETARIAT Tigray Regional State REDD+ Coordination Unit

Emergence of Environmental Thinking 1987: Environmental issues become political issues 1990s: Deforestation, greenhouse gas emissions and global warming became recurrent issues in the social discussion groups As these subjects gained more visibility – Civil society movement/environmnetal lobby groups – pressure on global leaders and the members of the Conference of the Parties (COP) to take action on issues

Cont… 1992: Rio Summit (Climate change and Biodiversity) 1997: the Kyoto Protocol (KP) on climate change was created in Japan in the third COP. – It set binding targets for 37 industrialized countries and the European community for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. – The Kyoto mechanisms (emissions trading, clean development mechanism, Joint Implementation) aimed to help those countries reach their emission reduction targets

How REDD+ emerged? Early 1990s: Deforestation 1/5 of GHG emissions However, the KP did not include the discussion about carbon emission reductions from avoided deforestation and forest degradation 2001 – COP 7: Avoided deforestation was too difficult to include in CDM (+ no additionality). Only A/R

How REDD+ evoloved? 2005: As the negotiations on climate change continued, at the eleventh COP session, the item “Reducing emissions from deforestation (RED) in developing countries and approaches to stimulate action” was introduced – COP 11: 2 year consultation period for RED

Cont… Papua New Guinea and Costa Rica (members of the Coalition for Rainforest Nations), proposed the discussion of this issue as an important item to mitigate climate change Hence, the idea of Reducing Emissions from Avoided Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD) first appeared.

Cont… Then different Parties and observers submitted proposals and recommendations on how to use REDD projects 2007: at the thirteenth COP, an agreement was reached with the Bali Action Plan, – The action points included the importance of carbon reductions from forests, but left the decision on a REDD regulation for the next Conference of the Parties

Cont… 2008: new topics on the REDD agenda, including forest conservation, sustainable management of forests and the enhancement of forests carbon stocks, in developing countries in UNFCCC meeting in Poznan The addition of these new areas to the previous negotiations introduced the concept of REDD-plus/REDD+.

Cont… 2009: the Copenhagen Accord recognized the contribution of REDD+ and its “crucial role” against climate change mitigation and the need to establish a framework for carbon emission reductions, which includes REDD+. Then REDD+ programs started to be used by the international community as a new alternative tool against climate change

Cont… Since RED was launched at COP11 and REDD+ was fully integrated into the global climate agenda at COP13 in 2007, it has come to be regarded as potentially one of the most effective and efficient mitigation strategies available today

Cont… Donors have pledged billions of dollars to REDD+ and new international programmes have been created, such as – the World Bank’s Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF), – the UN-REDD Programme and – the Forest Investment Program (FIP) of the World Bank. 2007: Norway’s Climate-Forest initiative, NOK 15 billions 2008+: FCPF (World Bank), UNREDD, other initiatives

Definition Based on the COP13 decision in Bali in 2007 REDD+ comprises local, national, and global actions whose primary aim is to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation and enhance forest carbon stocks in developing countries (Angelsen 2009a).

Evolution of REDD+ REDD+: The concept has become adapted and reconfigured as a result of emerging conflicts of interest and the lack of a new international climate agreement (I) From single to multiple objectives – Article 2: “stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system”

A brief history of REDD After 2005, other objectives were added – protecting biodiversity and reducing poverty/enhancing local livelihoods. – Co-benefits: strengthening indigenous rights, better governance and higher capacity for climate adaptation. – REDD+ is also increasingly linked to the agriculture– climate agenda. It has therefore gone from having single to multiple objectives 14

(I) From PES to broader policies to forest policies and projects? (II) From national to project focus (I II) Funding: From market to international public sources and national contributions

What is REDD+ all about? REDD+: Policy approaches & incentive mechanism REDD+ implementation requires enabling  Policy framework  Legal & regulatory framework  Institutional arrangements  Full & Effective stakeholder Consultation & participation  Technical capacity  Investment (Finance)

Phased approach for REDD+ Meridian (2009) & COP16 (UNFCCC 2010) The Cancun REDD+ decision recognizes implementation through a phased approach beginning with: I) The development of national strategies or action plans, policies and measures, and capacity building; II) The implementation of national policies and measures, and national strategies or action plans that could involve further capacity building, technology development and transfer and results‐based demonstration activities; and III) Results‐based actions that should be fully measured, reported, and verified. The choice of the starting phase of each country depends on national circumstances and available support.

Phased approaches for REDD+ Phase 3 – Result based actions Moving to more direct results-based actions, i.e. emissions and removals that should be fully measured, reported and verified, with payments based on these results