Woods Hole Research Center

A half-day workshop hosted by the Woods Hole Research Center in Durban, South Africa
12.00 – 16.00 Thursday, December 1st
Durban Country Club, Walter Gilbert Road, Durban 4025

 

Session 1: The economic and participatory implications of accurate forest measuring and monitoring for REDD+

WHRC Presenters: Alessandro Baccini, Josef Kellndorfer

Invited Panelists: Andrea Cattaneo (OECD), Jonah Busch (CI), Jeffery Hayward (Rainforest Alliance), Peter Holmgren (FAO, UN-REDD)

Mapping and monitoring carbon stocks in forested regions of the world is increasingly attracting attention as deforestation and forest degradation account for 10-20% of anthropogenic carbon emissions, and are now included in climate change negotiations as a relatively low-cost mitigation option. Implementation of the policy framework to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD) will be contingent on the capacity to accurately monitor reductions in emissions. Two broad approaches to quantifying forest carbon exist. The traditional approach relies on combining information from forest inventories with forest type classification maps to derive biomass and carbon values. While this is a viable first step for countries to achieve initial reporting on carbon stocks, much improvement can be expected from operational satellite remote sensing calibrated with forest inventory measurements. Maps of aboveground carbon produced in this way can be combined with forest change maps, or produced repeatedly years apart, to achieve detailed emissions maps at national and sub-national scales. These different philosophies have very different implications for uncertainty in emission factors estimates for REDD, which implies that the remuneration developing countries will receive will be affected. This occurs because the discount factor decreases with lower uncertainty about attained emissions reductions, resulting in an increase in value of emission reductions. We present a framework to analyze the economic implications of different multi-scale remote sensing and inventory-based measuring and monitoring (M&M) strategies, and we estimate the impact of M&M on REDD outcomes in a pantropical context. Early results indicate that benefits of an integrated remote sensing and field inventory M&M approach have the potential to outweigh the costs, thus more countries will want to opt into REDD with lower uncertainty levels (lower discount factor), and emissions reductions will be greater. For some categories of countries the impact of the M&M approach is felt even at the economy-wide level, increasing GDP. We conclude that it is important to overcome the obstacles holding back the adoption of more advanced M&M options in the REDD institutional framework, otherwise REDD will be less environmentally effective, fewer countries will benefit from REDD, and there will be a loss in cost-efficiency. The value associated with improved monitoring is a direct benefit of having satellites with sensors that are tailored for direct carbon and stock change estimation.

Agenda

Introduction
Scott Goetz, Woods Hole Research Center

Presentation 1:

Alessandro Baccini, Woods Hole Research Center

Implementation of the policy framework to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, which includes conservation and enhancement of forest carbon stocks and sustainable management of forests (REDD+), will be contingent on the capacity of participating countries to accurately monitor and measure reductions in emissions. This presentation will illustrate the sources of uncertainties related to CO2 emissions estimates due to deforestation and forest degradation. It will show a comparative analysis of three methodologies to derive carbon stocks estimates and present relative uncertainties.

Presentation 2:

Andrea Cattaneo, OECD

The presentation will address the economic and environmental implications for REDD+ of uncertainty forest carbon measurements. Results are presented decomposing the impact of uncertainty in area deforested (activity data) and in different ranges of uncertainty for carbon stock density (emission factor).

Presentation 3:

Jonah Busch, Conservation International

"Conservative accounting" for REDD+ has been proposed as a way of managing uncertainty associated with data on deforestation and carbon stocks. Conservative accounting promotes environmental integrity by assuring that the atmosphere receives at least as many emission reductions as buyers pay for, and promotes increases to the tier of accuracy of carbon measurements, but a tradeoff is that it also lowers the financial incentive to reduce emissions. We simulate the effects of alternative approaches to conservative accounting for REDD+ using the OSIRIS-Indonesia model and new carbon stock data from WHRC. We provide guidance on situations where conservative accounting is or is not recommended to maintain the environmental integrity of a REDD+ mechanism.

Presentation 4:

Josef Kellndorfer, Woods Hole Research Center

Significant improvements in availability and methods of using remote sensing data for forest cover and carbon monitoring has been made in recent years. The Group on Earth Observation is invested in progressing it's Societal Benefit area on "Global Forest Monitoring", and has a Forest Carbon Tracking Task which includes several National Demonstrator countries. At it's Eighth Plenary Session in mid-November GEO approved the 2012-2015 work plan which contains the "Global Forest Observation Initiative" as an attempt to build a global system for compliant forest carbon monitoring from the national scale to global scale. This talk gives a brief overview of these new initiatives to support REDD+ MRV, as well as some research examples how direct remote sensing methods of mapping carbon in fusion with national forest inventory systems can produce spatially explicit carbon maps which can feed into emissions assessment scenarios where reduction in uncertainties can be expected.

Panel Discussants:

Jonah Busch, Conservation International
Andrea Cattaneo, OECD
Dr Peter Holmgren, Director of FAO Climate, Energy and Tenure Division
Dr. Jeff Hayward, Rainforest Alliance
Dr. Scott Goetz, Woods Hole Research Center

Author and Panelist Biographies:

Dr. Alessandro Baccini is a remote sensing scientist whose interests focus on the use of satellite data for the monitoring of forest carbon, land cover, land cover change and the effects of environmental change on the terrestrial carbon cycle at the regional and global scale. Before joining the Center he was a research associate at Boston University and worked at the Food and Agriculture Organization of United Nations for the Forest Resources Assessment 1990 and 2000 monitoring tropical deforestation. He received his doctorate from Boston University.

Dr. Jonah Busch is the Climate and Forest Economist at Conservation International. Busch is the lead author and developer of the OSIRIS suite of free, online, open-source, spreadsheet-based decision support tools for estimating and mapping the climate, forest and revenue benefits of alternative policy decisions for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+). His scientific publications on the finance, scope, equity, reference level design and biodiversity co-benefits of REDD+ have appeared in PLoS Biology, Environmental Research Letters, Environmental Science and Policy, and Conservation Letters, as well as National Journal and the Jakarta Post. He has advised on REDD+ for the President of Guyana, Norway, Indonesia, Suriname, the United Kingdom, and the Global Environment Facility.

Dr. Andrea Cattaneo is an economist with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and holds a position as distinguished visiting scientist at the Woods Hole Research Center. Dr. Cattaneo authored scientific publications on the economics of deforestation, environmental policy design, the economics of environmental auctions, and the use of environmental indices for decision-making. Before joining OECD, he worked for the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), and the Economic Research Service (ERS) of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Andrea holds a Masters in environmental engineering and a Ph.D in economics from the Johns Hopkins University.

Dr. Scott Goetz is Deputy Director, Vice President for Science and a Senior Scientist at the Woods Hole Research Center, where he has been since 2003. Prior to that he was a Research Faculty member of the University of Maryland College Park, where he maintains an adjunct professor appointment, and he also worked at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center from 1985 to 1995. His research interests are focused on analyses of ecosystem response to environmental change, including monitoring and modeling links between forest productivity, biological diversity and water quality in relation to climate and land use change (e.g., urbanization, fire disturbance). Much of this research makes use of satellite imagery. He has authored, to date, ~100 refereed journal publications and book chapters, and has contributed to many other reports and proceedings. He is an associate editor of Remote Sensing of Environment and serves on the editorial board of Environmental Research Letters. He is a past associate editor of the Journal of Geophysical Research - Biogeosciences. He graduated from the Pennsylvania State University (BS), the University of California (MS), and the University of Maryland (PhD).

Dr. Jeff Hayward is the climate initiative manager for the Rainforest Alliance, providing leadership in a cross-divisional climate change initiative that spans forestry, agriculture and tourism. Based in Washington, DC, Hayward works globally with businesses and communities to promote climate mitigation and adaptation activities through responsible forestry, agriculture and tourism. His areas of climate expertise include: carbon verification; best practice, methodologies and standards for climate mitigation and adaptation; climate-oriented capacity building; climate policy; REDD; and the facilitation of carbon forestry and agroforestry projects.

Dr. Peter Holmgren is the Director of FAO Climate, Energy and Tenure Division. He holds an M.Sc. and a Ph.D. in Forestry from the Faculty of Forestry, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), Uppsala, Sweden. He has worked for FAO since 1998 where he has been Director of Environment, Climate Change and Bioenergy Division in the Natural Resources Management and Environment Department, and also assigned to the Forestry Department as responsible for forest resources development, planted forests, fire management and global and national forest resources assessments. Prior to joining FAO, he was Research Scientist at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences of Uppsala, Sweden, focusing on the application of geographic in formation in multipurpose forest management. He also worked in national forestry programmes development in the Philippines, Pakistan and Kenya, as well as with the private sector developing operational forestry systems.

Dr. Josef Kellndorfer focuses on the monitoring and assessment of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, and the dissemination of Earth observation findings to policy makers through education and capacity building. Using geographic information systems (GIS), remote sensing, and modeling, he studies land-use, land cover and climate change on a regional and global scale. His projects include carbon and biomass mapping of the United States, mapping forest cover across the tropical forested regions of Africa, Latin America and Asia through the generation of consistent data sets of high-resolution, cloud-free radar imagery. Before joining the Center, Kellndorfer was a research scientist with the Radiation Laboratory in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Michigan. He holds a diploma degree in physical geography and a doctorate in geosciences from the Ludwig-Maximilians-University in Munich, Germany. He serves on various expert working groups within NASA, the Group on Earth Observation, and GOFC-GOLD addressing forest carbon measurements in vegetation from remote sensing with existing and future remote sensing and field measurements.

Session 2: Social context of forest governance and community involvement in REDD+; case studies from Africa

WHRC Presenters: Glenn Bush, Ian Gray

Invited Panelists: Joanna Durbin (Climate, Community and Biodiversity Alliance), Bruno Guay & Bruno Hugel (UN REDD, DRC REDD National Coordination Unit), Judy Kimano (Green Belt Movement), Michael Richards (Forest Trends)

Equitable, effective and efficient governance of forest resources will be central to the success of national or sub-national REDD+ policy and management measures. Respecting and accounting for the rights and uses by forest dependent communities is essential in designing transparent carbon finance mechanisms that provide the right mix of incentives for household forest users to forgo the current scope and nature of benefits they derive from forest resources. Economic and social factors are only part of a complex combination of drivers and determinants affecting rates of deforestation. A key historical driver of deforestation in much of sub-Saharan Africa has been poor forest governance. Resolving weak law enforcement and uncertain tenure arrangements along with indigenous and local rights-based issues regarding who ‘owns’ the forests are critical institutional framework conditions that will shape the success of REDD+ implementation. One of the fundamental challenges of REDD+ is the establishment of robust and transparent forest monitoring and reporting systems in developing countries that address not only emissions reductions but also institutional reforms, consultation processes and social impacts. This requires that provisions be made for measuring, reporting and verification (MRV) beyond carbon.

This session will explore socio-economic and governance considerations of REDD+, including developing forest carbon monitoring and information systems, and implementing positive incentives for reducing deforestation on the ground, as synthesized from a range of ongoing projects and efforts.

Agenda

Introduction: REDD+ in a livelihoods context; critical socioeconomic and governance issues for sustainable forest management
Glenn Bush, Woods Hole Research Center

Presentation 1:

Social impact assessments of forest carbon projects; challenges, methods and an African case study

Michael Richards¹, Bettie Luwuge², Tuyeni Mwampamba²
Forest Trends¹, Tropical Forest Conservation Group²

The first part of the presentation will focus on the development of guidance for projects to undertake cost-effective social impact assessment (SIA). It will briefly say why SIA is needed; discuss some key challenges in the context of REDD+ and methodological options for responding to these challenges; describe the initiative of Forest Trends and CCBA to develop a Manual for the social and biodiversity impact assessment of REDD+ projects; and outline the proposed methodology and process for undertaking SIA. The second part of the presentation will feature a case study of the application of the SIA approach to the project ‘Making REDD work for Communities and Forest Conservation in Tanzania’ implemented by the NGO Tanzania Forest Conservation Group (TFCG) in conjunction with the Tanzanian Community Forest Conservation Network (MJUMITA). This project aims to promote and consolidate community-based forest management including through strengthened local governance, land use planning, sustainable agriculture, developing a carbon trading cooperative to aggregate and market the carbon, and community development plans.

Presentation 2:

Nesting the Local: Bridging the gaps between REDD design and informal village institutions in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Ian Gray¹, Glenn Bush² & Nadine Laporte²
Massachusetts Institute of Technology¹, Woods Hole Research Center²

Achieving reductions in rural deforestation rates in the Congo Basin depends heavily on connecting carbon finance to rural development needs. In the DRC, there is a lack of functional formal institutions at the sub-Provincial level that can readily assist in this process. Without re-inventing the wheel, this presentation suggests how REDD initiatives can match existing and emerging formal institutions with informal practices of collective action and resource governance. It takes as its case study a comparative look at two forest communities in the Province of Equateur, DRC.

Presentation 3:

Judy Kimamao, Green Belt Movement

The Green Belt Movement is one of the most prominent Grass roots organization, based in Kenya, that advocates for human rights and support to good governance and peaceful democratic change through the protection of the environment. What began as a grassroots tree planting program to address the challenges of deforestation, soil erosion and lack of water is now a vehicle for empowering women. The act of planting a tree is helping women throughout Africa become stewards of the natural environment. GBM operates by organizing a network of small groups of grass roots community members (known as Tree Nursery Groups) in both rural and county settings to grow plant and care for trees in “greenbelts” on public and private lands. The Movement has organized more than 6,000 groups in villages across the country and has planted over 20 million trees. Over the last ten years, GBM has adopted a “conscientization” approach to mobilize community consciousness for self-determination, equity, improved livelihood and environmental conservation. It has helped hundreds of grassroots leaders to advocate for social, economic and political justice. Participation in the GBM activities has opened up democratic spaces for women to take up leadership roles, successfully manage their nurseries, closely collaborate with foresters and local authorities, participate in income generating activities, plan and implement community-based projects such as water harvesting and food security. The women are not only able to help GBM accomplish GBM’s objective of limiting forest degradation, but at the same time gain skills, confidence, and income.

Presentation 4:
Bruno Hugel, UN REDD, DRC, REDD National Coordination Unit

REDD+ is intended to be a result-based mechanism, which can be particularly challenging in certain context such as Eastern DRC, more famous for conflicts than for sustainable natural resource management. Still, community projects can be successful if the design and management processes are sensitive and adaptive to the local conditions. This presentation highlights the challenges as well as responses from the EcoMakala project, aiming at creating an alternative to the illegal and non-sustainable exploitation of Virunga National Park’s natural forests while fighting poverty and promoting local development.

Panel Discussants:

Dr Joanna Durbin, Climate, Community & Biodiversity Alliance
Mr. Bruno Guay, UN REDD, DRC National Coordination Unit
Dr Nadine Laporte, Woods Hole Research Center

Author and Panelist Biographies:

Dr. Glenn Bush – is an assistant scientist and environmental economist at the Woods Hole Research Center. He specializes in welfare economics, resource valuation, and environmental cost-benefit analysis. His work has focused on quantitative valuation of forest conservation strategies for forest-adjacent households, as well as the microeconomic and social determinants of forest conservation. He is currently concerned with developing and testing combined econometric and spatial models on the drivers and determinants of land cover change and the application of economic and social research methods to REDD+ social impact assessment. Dr. Bush has previously worked in Africa and in Central and Southeast Asia as a researcher, project manager, and consultant on natural resource management and conservation projects in the public and private sector. He has held positions with the UK Government Department for International Development, the Wildlife Conservation Society, and the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International. He obtained his M.Sc. in Agricultural Economics from the University of London, Wye College, and his Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Stirling, UK.

Dr. Nadine Laporte – is an associate scientist at the Woods Hole Research Center. She is a biologist whose research centers on the applications of satellite imagery to tropical forest ecosystems, including vegetation & carbon mapping, land-use change, and deforestation causes and consequences on carbon and biodiversity. She has been involved in numerous environmental projects in Central Africa over the past 20 years, working with in-country scientists, foresters, and international conservation organizations to develop integrated forest monitoring systems and promote forest conservation. She received her doctorate in tropical biogeography from l'Université Paul Sabatier in Toulouse, France. Before joining the Woods Hole Research Center, she worked at the Joint Research Center in Italy, the NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center and the University of Maryland. She serves also on various expert working groups within NASA, UN-REDD, and the World Bank, among others, addressing forest carbon monitoring systems from remote sensing and field measurements to help Reduce Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD) as part of United Nations climate change policy.

Ian Gray - is a final year postgraduate student of Environmental Policy and Planning at MIT’s Department of Urban Studies and Planning. He is interested in the linkages between climate change and development, particularly the localization of governance techniques and practices for managing carbon in tropical forest countries through mechanisms such as REDD. He served as a Harvard Sustainability Science Summer Research Fellow at the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington D.C. and previously worked at Ceres, a US based environmental finance policy group. Currently, he is writing a thesis on the political economy of carbon finance in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Bettie Luwuge, Tanzania Forest Conservation Group, is a Tanzanian Participatory Natural Resources Management specialist currently employed by the Tanzania Forest Conservation Group as Project Manager for the project ‘Making REDD work for Communities and Forest Conservation in Tanzania’. Since 2002 she has been assisting rural communities in the Eastern Arc Mountains and Coastal zone of Tanzania to establish participatory forest management. She has played a prominent role in the establishment of the Tanzanian Community Forest Conservation Network (MJUMITA) which provides a forum for capacity building, governance learning, advocacy and communication amongst local communities. After receiving training in facilitating Social Impact Assessments for REDD projects from Forest Trends, Ms Luwuge has coordinated the implementation of the two participatory Social Impact Assessments for the REDD project in Tanzania.

Dr. Tuyeni Heita Mwampamba is a Tanzanian ecologist currently employed as a post-doctorate researcher in the National Autonomous University of Mexico. Her research interests include quantifying ecosystem services in community managed forests, assessing the impact of ecosystem service payment programs on forest quality and social welfare, and determining the configuration of social and environmental factors necessary for effective participation of communities in PES programs. Her research areas are in Mexico and Tanzania. Tuyeni has been conducting social impact assessments (SIA) since 2001 as an employee of Norconsult Tanzania, and in 2010 and 2011 she co-facilitated SIA training courses for REDD project staff in East Africa as a consultant for Forest Trends. This year, Tuyeni assisted the Tanzania Community Forest Conservation Network and the Tanzania Forest Conservation Group to conduct SIAs for their two REDD projects.

Dr. Michael Richards of Forest Trends is a natural resources economist with over 30 years research and development experience in Africa, Latin America and Asia. Based in the UK, he supports Forest Trends’ work in Africa and Latin America, and his recent work has focused on the development of social impact assessment methods for multiple-benefit carbon projects. Prior to Forest Trends, he worked for 8 years at the UK Overseas Development Institute, and on long-term assignments in Ghana, Honduras, Malawi, Mexico and Sri Lanka on agricultural, forestry and rural development projects. Over the last 20 years he has worked mainly on policy, institutional and methodology issues surrounding payments for ecosystem services, participatory forest management and economic incentives for sustainable forestry management, and written several papers and books on these topics. He has a PhD from the University of Glamorgan in Wales, an MSc in Agricultural Economics from the University of London, and a BA in Land Economy from the University of Cambridge. His interest in REDD+ is that it becomes an effective instrument both for mitigating climate change and improving the life of rural communities, but that this also require vital governance, tenure and policy reforms – which must anyway be part of REDD+ for it to succeed. He is concerned about the potential negative social impacts of REDD+, but believes that appropriate social monitoring methodologies at the national and sub-national levels can play a key role.

Bruno Guay - Technical advisor, REDD DRC National Coordination - UNDP
Since April 2009, Bruno has been working as technical advisor to the National REDDCoordination of the Democratic Republic of Congo, a position supported through the UN-REDD program (UNDP). The National REDD Coordination has been mandated by the Prime Minister to manage the day-to-day operations of the REDD process in DRC. Prior to joining the National REDD Coordination, Bruno worked as a climate change analyst for the OECD, worked on Project Design Documents (PDD) for Afforestation/Reforestation Clean Development Mechanism (A/R CDM) projects, and supported the work of the government of Panama on international negotiations on REDD under UNFCCC.

Bruno Hugel - Technical advisor, REDD DRC National Coordination - UNDP
Since August 2010, Bruno Hugel has been working as technical advisor to the National REDD Coordination of the Democratic Republic of Congo, a position supported through the UN-REDD program (UNDP). The National REDD Coordination has been mandated by the Prime Minister to manage the day-to-day operations of the REDD process in DRC. Prior to joining the National REDD Coordination, Bruno worked with WWF as well as national and local organizations in Africa, especially in Uganda and DRC, including as project manager for large scale community conservation and sustainable natural resource management projects.

Dr. Joanna Durbin - leads the Climate, Community & Biodiversity Alliance (CCBA), a partnership of NGOs with a mission to stimulate land-based carbon activities improve the well-being and reduce poverty of local communities and conserve biodiversity. She has four years experience developing and managing standards for social and environmental impacts of REDD+ activities through transparent and inclusive multi-stakeholder processes including the Climate, Community & Biodiversity (CCB) Standards, the leading multiple-benefit standard for land-based carbon projects, and the REDD+ Social & Environmental Standards (REDD+ SES) that assess the social and environmental performance of government-led REDD+ programs. She has over 20 years experience developing community-based institutions and shared governance with government and other partners for effective biodiversity conservation and sustainable development.

Judy Nyaguthii Kimamo - works with the Green Belt Movement, as a Senior Project Officer responsible for capacity building of Women and Girls. She is committed to women and girl livelihood improvement and rights issues, social and economic justice and environmental Justice. She Holds a Bachelor of Science Degree, Natural Sciences and has more than 7 years of experience with the Green Belt Movement in dealing with community based organizations and groups for pro action, self betterment and improvement of livelihoods. She works with community women, youth and school based groups and civic leaders to be the change agents who will bring about the change the communities desire.