The special issue of Forests¨The potential role for community monitoring in MRV and benefit sharing for REDD+¨

Presented at the CoP20 Side Event: ¨REDD+ monitoring needs to support the distribution of MRV and benefit sharing¨

Lima, Peru, December 1 2014

What do we still need to know about community monitoring for REDD+?

• At the Warsaw CoP19, the discussion at the side event on community monitoring suggested that:– Community monitoring is feasible, can be as accurate

as professional forest surveys, and cheaper– New technology can support this– It could motivate better management– It might be used as the basis of benefit distribution in

REDD+– It could link into and support national MRV systems,

but more study would be needed on this

• The aim of the Special Issue was to discuss and explore social, technical and political implications and the potential for including CB monitoring in national MRV and benefit sharing systems

• 7 articles are already posted on the website, including one case study (Nepal)

• 2 are in final editing stage, including a second case study (Guyana)

• The editorial will be partly based on the results of this side event and the survey monkey

Contents of Special Issue• Editorial (Skutsch and Balderas Torres)• Balderas Torres: Potential for integrating community based monitoring into REDD+• Pratihaast et al Combining satellite data and community-based observations for forest

monitoring• Brofeldt et al: Community monitoring of carbon stocks for REDD+: does accuracy and

cost change over time?• Balderas Torres et al: Integrating CBM into land-use based mitigation actions

implemented by local communities• Paneque-Galvez et al: Small drones for community based forest monitoring: an

assessment of their feasibility and potential in tropical areas• Skutsch et al: Options for a national framework for benefit distribution and their relation to

community based and national REDD+ monitoring• Boissière et al: Participation in REDD+ MRV (PMRV): opportunities for local people?• Shrestra et al: Case Study report: REDD+ pilot rojet in community forests in 3 watersheds

of Nepal• Bellfield et al: Case Study report: Community based monitoring systems for REDD: a

casestudy from Guyana

What do these papers say? Balderas Torres in the introductory article

suggests that there are 4 potential roles of community monitoring• Increasing the sample size of carbon plots,

supplementing the set from national inventires• Providing carbon data particularly on areas where

there have been public interventions/programmes for improved management

• Providing carbon data on independent projects which are selling credits in the voluntary market

• Providing non-carbon data on compliance with safeguards

Monitoring is not only about quantifying carbon stock changes. Prastihaast et al is about monitoring forest disturbances (their locations, size, timing and causes). Community experts the on ground versus SPOT5 and

Rapid Eye data; Generally good correspondence; Mobile devices worked better than paperbased

(photos, GPS etc) Local expert data not evenly spread over the area Somewhat inconsistent monitoring frequency Better results in monitoring degradation than

deforestation Local data is about land use, remote sensing about

land cover

Brofeldt et al follow up on earlier work and Show that accuracy of community carbon

stock measurements improves over time confirm earlier findings that costs of

community measurement are less than for professional foresters

stress that successful monitoring is related to use of simple measurement methods

Balderas Torres et al examine the potential and sustainability of community monitoring in the 13 projects in REDD+ Early Action programmes in Mexico. They note that: they each have their own approach (non-

standardised); all have the resources and capacity to carry out

monitoring, but in most (though not all) cases, these skills are in

the hands of intermediary organizations, not within the communities themselves.

They conclude that major capacity building would be needed if communities were to do the monitoring on their own.

• Paneque-Galvez et al explore the possibility of drones for community based surveys The technical potential is excellent, and the costs

are relatively low Advantages: possibility for high frequency data,

sytematic coverage, good assessment of areas of degadation

Disadvantages: airspace regulations (?); local social tensions

Should first be tested in areas where communities are already involved in monitoring, for comparison

Skutsch et al start from point of view of systems for distribution of benefits under national REDD+ programmes (input versus output based) and show that:

output-based systems would need much more, and more accurate, data at local level than input based systems, with associated transaction costs

it would be impossible for each community to provide data on its reduced D&D without an individual baseline

in connecting to national MRV systems, a main function of local data could be to assess the success/failure of public policies/interventions , on basis of carbon and social data

• Boissière et al. is a research design for further study, with a focus on looking at how local data can flow to national databases. Social analysis to probe the enabling conditions

for local participation Goverance analysis to understand data flow,

using the health sector as a comparison Remote sensing work to compare the gap

between local (land use) and national (land cover) approaches

A very rich and thoughtful design which hopefully will soon provide interesting results

Shrestra et al. present evidence that local communities can measure growth in their carbon stocks; benefit sharing is in part based on the

measured increase, but weighted to take into account social indicatators (less priviledged communities receive a higher payment per ton).

they do not measure reductions in emissions, but rather forest enhancements

Bellfield et al. present the case of community monitoring in Guyana, explaining how partnerships were built between local and national institutions, and discussing the divergence of expectations and realities across different scales and among different stakeholders.

So what is still uncertain? If community monitored data is to feed into and strengthen the

national MRV database, the monitoring will require standardization, which may reduce community interest; what should be included, and who should decide this?

If it is only about monitoring carbon stocks, communities may not be so interested

In a performance based benefit distribution system, how can benefits be distributed also to local actors outside the forest?

Can performance based benefit systems respond to equity concerns at levels above the project level?

Who should design or set rules for the benefit distribution systems – UNFCCC level or national?

Should communities be paid for monitoring apart from any benefits for forest management /carbon?

Hopefully the discussion today will help to move us towards answers to some of these questions!

Thank you for your attention