Transboundary REDD+ Programme in HimalayasSaturday, 12 November 2016COP22 Green Zone09:00–10:30

INDIA@COP22

South-South Cooperation for Climate Change Mitigation

Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education (ICFRE), Dehradun, India

International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD), Kathmandu, Nepal

International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)

Organising partners: Funding partners:

Time Presentation Speaker09:00-09:05 Introduction to the event & participants Dr. G.S. Goraya, Deputy Director General (Research),

ICFRE09:05-09:15 Indian perspective on REDD+ Dr. Shashi Kumar - Session chair

Director General, ICFRE

09:15-09:25 Trans-boundary REDD+ for South-South Cooperation – ICIMOD Initiative

Mr. Kai Windhorst, Chief Technical Advisor, GIZ, ICIMOD, Kathmandu, Nepal

09:25-09:35 REDD+ and climate change Dr. Sandeep Sengupta, Global Coordinator, Climate Change Portfolio, IUCN

09:35-09:45 Piloting REDD+ in Indian Himalaya region

Dr. T.P. Singh, Assistant Director-General, Biodiversity and Climate Change, ICFRE

09:45-09:55 REDD+ and Communities participation: Nepal experience

Representative from Nepal

09:55-10:05 REDD+ preparedness: Bhutan experi-ence: Representative from Bhutan

Representative from Bhutan

10:05-10:15 CDM Experience from Indian Himalayas Dr. Ajay Lal, HP Forest Department, India10:15-10:30 Questions & answers

REDD+ is now widely recognised as a financial incentive to communities for their contribution in reducing GHG emissions by way of stemming deforestation and forest degradation, and the enhancement of forest carbon stocks through the conservation and sustainable de-velopment of forests. The methodological guidance for implementing REDD+ at the national (and subnational) level has been agreed under UNFCCC. The mechanism is very important for the Himalayan region, a biological hotspot that is facing rapid deforestation and forest degradation due to anthropogenic and climatic factors.

The Himalayan countries of India, Nepal, Bhutan and Myanmar share a common socio-economic legacy, and are also preparing their national REDD+ Strategy and Action Plans, developing REDD+ Reference Levels/Ref-erence Emission Levels, Safeguard Information Systems (SIS) and the systems of National Forest Monitoring (NFM). All these elements are essentially required, in accordance with the COP decisions, for REDD+ funding through Green Climate Fund (GCF). REDD+ programmes are of utmost importance to the communities resid-ing in the Himalayan region, as a large population still depends on forests for their livelihood. India, Nepal, Bhutan and Myanmar have now starting taking some

Overviewsteps to engage themselves in REDD+ Programmes. However, their capacities to meet various international standards related to REDD+ are very weak. Some spo-radic pilot projects have been initiated through bilateral and multilateral funding.

All these countries are at different levels of prepared-ness for REDD+ implementation. India is in a relatively strong position on account of its national forest moni-toring systems and the Joint Forest Management (JFM) structure. The four countries under the aegis of ICIMOD have started implementing a Trans-boundary REDD+ Programme in the Himalayan region of India, Bhutan, Nepal, and Myanmar.

The objectives of this event are: (i) to share the REDD+ Trans-boundary Programme implementation in the Himalayan countries with a larger audience, (ii) to learn from each others’ experience in preparation of vari-ous REDD+ related intricacies such as SIS, developing REDD+ reference levels, and NFM, and (iii) to promote south-south cooperation for mitigating climate change. It will contribute to the development of a common guid-ing framework for implementing REDD+ in the Himala-yas and provide a platform to share experiences from other countries on various aspects of REDD+ implemen-tation such as national strategy and action plans, SIS, and MRV etc. Agenda

Photo: Meghdut Gorai/Flickr Creative Commons

For more information, contact: Dr. T.P. Singh Email: tpsingh@icfre.orgTel: 0135 2750296 Cell: 941 0327527