Side event – The Private Sector and
REDD+: Trends, challenges and opportunities; Thursday,
29 November, 2012; 9:00
– 10:15 am; Diplomatic
Club, Doha, Qatar
NEWS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact- (Doha, Qatar) +254 721 537 627; e.kahurani@cgiar.org
The Role of the Private Sector in Climate Change Interventions
Involving
the private sector in REDD+ (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest
Degradation) will be key to its success, says a new study by the ASB
Partnership for the Tropical Forest Margins at the World Agroforestry Centre
(ASB-ICRAF) and the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD).
Funding is a
major concern in the implementation of REDD+ activities and involving the
private sector will be absolutely critical to scale up investment in
REDD+. It is estimated that betweenUS$17–40 billion per year is needed to realize the potential
of forests to mitigate climate change. But
since 2008, funding for the REDD+ mechanism has been largely in the form of public
donor pledges, which fall far below this target at an approximate cumulative
figure of US$7.2 billion. To mobilize funds for meeting the needs of developing
countries in climate mitigation and adaptation, a decision to establish a Green
Climate Fund (GCF) was made at the last Conference of the Parties (COP 17). The
GCF is intended to mobilize US$100 billion annually by 2020 and has within it a
“private sector facility” that targets funds from private sector sources.
Besides
increasing the scale and speed at which investment needs to flow, the private
sector can also make vital contributions to REDD+ initiatives through its technical expertise. In this
way, the private sector can, be part of the solution to mitigating climate
change by addressing key drivers of deforestation.
REDD+ is a
mechanism that aims at compensating developing countries that forgo development
activities that cause deforestation. It is part of global efforts to combat
climate change, encompasses the role of conservation, sustainable management of
forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks in developing countries.
The extent
to which the private sector potential is effectively used to meet climate
objectives, such as through REDD+ highly depends on i) a thorough understanding of the actors, including their areas of
strength and capabilities that can be synergized to leverage on opportunities;
and ii) Incentives needed to attract
private sector engagement and investment at scale.
These are vital
aspects explored in a new study titled The
Private Sector in the REDD+ Supply Chain: Trends, challenges and opportunities. The study identified
several private sector actors engaged in REDD+, including investment banks seeking
future investment opportunities or to become ‘’carbon neutral’’, emission-intensive
industries looking to offset carbon credits for pre-compliance/compliance, multinational
firms through their voluntary Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) programmes
and for branding/image purposes, companies developing REDD+ projects, brokering
firms, consulting companies offering technical expertise and capacity building
and auditors, among others.
A conducive
regulatory and policy environment that cushions against risk is key to moving
forward on private sector engagement. “Policy clarity and certainty are
critical determinants of private sector involvement in REDD+, both
internationally and nationally,” explains Florence Bernard, Programme Associate
at ASB-ICRAF and lead author of the study. “Governments need to make a
deliberate intention to actively engage the private sector in national
legislation and sectoral planning.”
Other
necessary incentives for engagement involve including REDD+ in compliance
markets to increase demand for REDD+ credits, ensuring clear land and carbon
ownership systems, and engaging the private sector to address the fundamental
drivers of deforestation. It is also crucial that the private sector’s
investments are secured with performance-based payments issued directly to
projects independently of national–level performance, through adequate
embedding or “nesting” of projects within national level monitoring, compliance
and overall accountability systems.
An
in-depth discussion of these and other results from the study will be discussed
at a side event organized by The International Emissions Trading Association
(IETA) in partnership with IISD and ASB-ICRAF at the UNFCCC
COP 18 on Thursday,
29 November, 2012 at 9:00 – 10:15 am,
Diplomatic Club, Doha, Qatar.
##
For
the past three years, IISD (www.iisd.org)
has partnered with the ASB Partnership
for the Tropical Forest Margins (www.asb.cgiar.org)
at the World Agroforestry Centre (www.worldagroforestry.org)
to deliver a project aimed at addressing
these challenges through information sharing and research to encourage
innovative thinking and the continuous improvement of REDD+ processes and
strategies. The project engaged over 300 developing country experts who
identified topics of importance and inputted into the policy research process.
The final year of the project focused on two critical determinants of REDD+
success, namely:
- Developing and
implementing REDD+ safeguard information systems (SIS)
- Fostering effective
private sector engagement in the REDD+ supply chain
Ahead
of COP 18, IISD and ASB-ICRAF has released a series
of publications to further explore these
critical issue areas. The publications are the result of
substantive research that included an extensive desk study, in-country
semi-structured interviews with REDD+ experts and practitioners, and regional
expert meetings.
