The United Nations Programme on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (UN-REDD Programme) is a joint programme of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) that works with partner countries on technical and institutional preparation for implementing REDD+.
Established in 2008, the programme operates through a trust fund that pools voluntary donor contributions for REDD+ readiness and related support. In its 2022 annual report, UN-REDD reported 65 partner countries, including 23 in Africa, 20 in Asia-Pacific, and 22 in Latin America and the Caribbean.
Work described by the programme includes support for national REDD+ strategies and institutions, development of forest monitoring systems and measurement, reporting and verification (MRV), and work on safeguards and stakeholder participation mechanisms, including processes involving indigenous peoples, local communities and civil society.
History UN-REDD was created in 2008 following UNFCCC decisions on the Bali Action Plan and negotiations on REDD at COP 13. It has operated through a trust fund established in 2008 to pool donor contributions for programme activities.
UN-REDD forms part of a wider set of international initiatives that developed to provide frameworks or funding for REDD+ readiness, alongside efforts such as the World Bank's Forest Carbon Partnership Facility.
By 2022, UN-REDD reported 65 partner countries spanning Africa, Asia-Pacific and Latin America and the Caribbean.
Mandate and scope UN-REDD describes its mandate as supporting nationally led REDD+ processes and encouraging stakeholder participation, including by indigenous peoples and other forest-dependent communities.
The programme's 2016–2020 Strategic Framework set an overall goal of reducing emissions from forests and enhancing forest carbon stocks, linked to national sustainable development.
Relationship to REDD+ under the UNFCCC REDD+ is a voluntary climate change mitigation approach developed by Parties to the UNFCCC. UN-REDD is a multilateral programme that supports developing countries in establishing the technical capacities used in REDD+ readiness and implementation, including capacities linked to UNFCCC requirements for results-based payments.
Related initiatives In addition to UN-REDD, initiatives assisting countries engaged in REDD+ include the World Bank's Forest Carbon Partnership Facility, Norway's International Climate and Forest Initiative, the Global Environment Facility, Australia's International Forest Carbon Initiative, the Collaborative Partnership on Forests, and the Green Climate Fund.
Governance UN-REDD is implemented jointly by FAO, UNDP and UNEP. Programme documents describe governance arrangements intended to include partner countries and donors alongside representation from Indigenous peoples and civil society organizations, alongside the participating UN agencies.
Executive Board The UN-REDD Programme Executive Board provides overall oversight and makes decisions on allocations from the UN-REDD Programme Fund. It meets bi-annually, or more frequently as required.
Assembly The UN-REDD Programme Assembly is a multi-stakeholder forum for consultation and exchange among programme stakeholders, governed by organizations such as the United Nations, and the World Bank.
National Steering Committees National Steering Committees support country ownership and coordination of National REDD+ Programmes and may include representatives of civil society and indigenous peoples. Programme documents describe these committees as providing oversight and addressing changes in national programme implementation.
Multi-Party Trust Fund Office The Multi-Party Trust Fund Office provides funding administration for the UN-REDD Programme.
In addition, it also provides financial transparency reports, releases funding to appropriate and participating UN agencies such as the FAO, UNDP and UNEP and manages donor contributions to support financial flow.
Funding and donors UN-REDD is financed through voluntary contributions to the UN-REDD Programme Fund. Donors have included the European Union and the governments of Denmark, Japan, Luxembourg, Norway, the Republic of Korea, Spain, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and others. As of 31 December 2023, Norway had contributed US$313,708,254.07 of US$377,696,356.05 in total donor contributions to the UN-REDD Programme Fund.
REDD+ financing has evolved into large scale funding as result of the international carbon market and it's newfound and greater reliance on public and bilateral funding primarily provided by governments and international donors. The slow development of the global carbon market under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change has attributed to the changing shifts of bilateral funding. To combat this issue, countries such as Norway, Germany and the United Kingdom have provided bilateral funding opportunities to many foreign governments, including Brazil, Guyana and Indonesia. However, this raises concerns for the future financing of REDD, its long-term sustainability, and the financial risks associated with ongoing bilateral agreements.
Strategy and results frameworks
2016–2020 Strategic Framework In collaboration with FAO, UNDP and UNEP, the UN-REDD Programme developed the 2016-2020 Strategic Framework that introduced the M&E structure and "theory of change" model, which linked the programme input to long term REDD+ objectives.
The UN-REDD Programme's 2016–2020 Strategic Framework set out an overall goal and organised programme work around three outcomes and associated outputs, alongside cross-cutting themes including stakeholder engagement, forest governance, tenure security and gender equality.
2021–2025 results framework and strategy to 2030 In 2020, the UN-REDD Executive Board adopted a results framework for 2021–2025.
Terms of reference for the UN-REDD Programme Fund (extended on 30 August 2023) set out a longer-term strategy to 2030 organised around four outcomes: realising forest solutions, rewarding forest solutions, enhancing forest solutions, and connecting actors and knowledge for forest solutions. The same terms of reference describe the 2021–2025 results framework as structured around outputs intended to support annual work plans and budgets and monitoring and reporting on programme implementation.
Workstreams
Readiness support to partner countries Readiness support to partner countries has combined direct funding with technical assistance to governments designing and implementing national REDD+ programmes. UN-REDD has also provided targeted assistance for specific national REDD+ actions and supported capacity-building activities such as methodological guidance, tools and data support, and exchanges among partner countries.
Forest monitoring and MRV UN-REDD support has included assistance aimed at developing or strengthening forest monitoring and measurement, reporting and verification (MRV) capacity for REDD+ readiness and implementation. UN-REDD has been identified in comparative research as one of several initiatives contributing to MRV institutionalisation in countries including Indonesia, Peru and Tanzania.
In its 2022 annual report, UN-REDD described the UNFCCC Warsaw Framework on REDD-plus as comprising national strategies or action plans, forest reference emission levels or forest reference levels, national forest monitoring systems with MRV, and safeguards information systems, and stated that it supports partner countries in establishing or improving these elements.
Safeguards and stakeholder engagement Work on safeguards and stakeholder engagement forms part of UN-REDD's readiness support. The programme describes its approach as including stakeholder participation in REDD+ processes, including by indigenous peoples and other forest-dependent communities.
A programme overview covering 2008–2013 linked UN-REDD safeguards work to the UNFCCC safeguards agreed at COP16 in Cancun (see Cancún safeguards), including provisions on respecting the rights of indigenous peoples and local communities and ensuring their participation. UN-REDD has also stated that it supports partner countries in establishing or improving safeguards information systems so that social and environmental considerations are addressed in REDD+ implementation.
Participation mechanisms have included representation of civil society organizations and indigenous peoples in UN-REDD deliberations and support for national-level structures intended to enable engagement of civil society and indigenous peoples in REDD+ decision-making in partner countries.
The programme has produced guidance and tools on safeguards and participation, including Social and Environmental Principles and Criteria, and has supported partner countries in developing grievance redress mechanisms. UN-REDD has also developed guidance related to free, prior and informed consent (FPIC), a consent-based process discussed in safeguards guidance as a way for affected indigenous peoples and local communities to make informed decisions about whether and how to participate in REDD+ activities.
However, research has demonstrated that verifying compliance of participating countries is often labor and resource intensive. Finance programs indicate that countries face significant technical and financial burdens to prove their compliance with the given rules of REDD+. Data monitoring that tracks social and environmental impacts requires large scale operations that are often lagging, cutting into seemingly guaranteed funding opportunities.
Activities and outputs
Publications UN-REDD has stated that it publicly releases an annual programme progress report and a semi-annual report.
The UN-REDD progress and semi-annual reports consist of technical documents and policies that report on issues such as indigenous participation, government frameworks, accessibility mechanisms and benefits proctored by the programme, including informed consent (FPIC) and analyses of REDD+ implementation.
UN-REDD publications in recent years have included regional and national case studies that examine land use practices and effectiveness of REDD+ framework to effectively understand the capacity required to achieve current climate goals.
Country-level examples Examples of UN-REDD readiness support documented in government and third-party reporting and published literature include:
Democratic Republic of the Congo: In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, UN-REDD supported forest monitoring and inventory readiness work, including training forest inventory teams and preparatory inventory activities, and supported the development of plans for a national forest monitoring system. UN-REDD also supported work on national social and environmental standards within the REDD+ process.
Indonesia: In Indonesia, UN-REDD supported capacity building linked to forest monitoring for REDD+, including work connected to forest inventory data management systems used in MRV workflows.
Viet Nam: In Viet Nam, UN-REDD supported the development of national or sub-national guidance related to free, prior and informed consent (FPIC) as part of safeguards and participation work for REDD+ readiness, alongside programme-level FPIC guidance.
Papua New Guinea: In Papua New Guinea, UN-REDD supported the development of national or sub-national FPIC guidance in connection with safeguards and stakeholder engagement in REDD+ readiness support. Nepal: In Nepal, REDD+ has co-collaborated and launched pilot projects with local forest management programs to demonstrate how community participation can reduce emissions and lead to sustainable forestry.