Presented by Stibniati Atmadja (CIFOR-ICRAF), at International Climate Finance Workshop, on 2 October 2022

1. 2nd International Climate Finance Workshop
Center for Climate Finance and Sustainability (CCFS) at the Universitá della Svizzera Italiana (USI), Lugano, Switzerland
USI Executive Center, Aula Rosso, October 2, 2022
The global landscape of projects to reduce
emissions from deforestation and forest
degradation (REDD+) - Update from 2020 and
current trends
Dr. Stibniati Atmadja
s.atmadja@cgiar.org
CIFOR-ICRAF, Indonesia
CIRAD, France

2. Expectations
• What to expect of me
• Introduction (2)
• What to expect of this presentation: Describe + Reflect
• Concepts (3)
• REDD+ expectations (1)
• REDD+ realities (8)
• REDD+ outlook (3)
• Reflections

3. Introduction – Hi!
• Multi-disciplinary: Economist from the forestry department
(NCSU, 2008) – Natural Resources, esp. tropical forests;
Bachelor of Env. Sci, Bachelor of Econ.
• Multi-country:
• Lived/worked: Indonesia, Philippines, Australia, US,
Ethiopia, France
• Global teams (current):
• Global Comparative Study on REDD+ (2009-Now):
Indonesia, Ethiopia, DRC, Peru
• Transparent Monitoring (2020-Now): Ethiopia, Côte
d’Ivoire, PNG, Pru
• Women’s Resource Rights (2021-Now): Ethiopia,
Uganda, Kazakhstan, the Gambia, Niger, Colombia,
Bangladesh
• Field work: HH/community surveys (Indonesia, Ethiopia);
Cause of peat fires (Indonesia) + Activity leakage
(Indonesia)
- Policy work (Current): REDD+ MRV and Finance; Gender
(MoAg and REDD+ Secretariat Ethiopia; UBA + IKI,
Germany); EU DG Clima; UNDP

4. Introduction – ID-RECCO
• ID-RECCO: International Database on REDD+ Projects
linking data on Economics, Carbon and Communities
(https://www.reddprojectsdatabase.org/
• Database established in 2015 by Gabriela Simonet
for her PhD.
• Managed by CIFOR since 2018, by me since 2020.
• Updated every 2 years. Currently 2022 update
• 110+ variables: REDD+ project description, carbon
certification, sources of financing, interventions,
project proponents
• Objective: provide OPEN ACCES, uniform, global,
systematic, updated data on REDD+ projects and
programs
2022 ID‐RECCO
Update Team
Rowan Alusiola Igor Barboza Lia Sartika
Mella Komalasari Stibniati Atmadja

5. Concepts
“Forest carbon”
Green house gas (GHG) sequestration and storage by standing forests
(removals), including peatlands
“REDD+”
Reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation and enhancing
carbon stocks
Deforestation: from forest to non-forest (bare land, other land uses)
Degradation: reduction of forest biodiversity, biomass, and other ecosystem
services
Enhancing carbon stocks: reforestation/afforestation, better forest management

6. Concepts
• REDD+ Projects
• Area: Does not follow political boundaries (e.g., parcels, concessions,
biospheres, community lands)
• Market orientation: Voluntary carbon markets (VCM)
• Results-based payment model: Preparation  Certification (Validation –
Verification)  Credit issuance  Carbon transactions*
• Non-Annex 1 countries
• REDD+ Jurisdictional programs
• Area: Follows a political boundary (e.g., country, province)
• Oriented towards UNFCCC’s Warsaw Framework (2013) and the Paris
Agreement (2015)
• Can include projects (“nested”), but rules are unclear
• Results-based payment model: “Readiness”  Implementation  Results
Based Payment
• Non-Annex 1 countries

7. Concepts
• Carbon accounting - REDD+ projects (Voluntary Emission Reductions/VERs)
• Accounting based on applicable methods accepted/established by carbon standards (in the
voluntary carbon markets/VCM)
• Based on comparing emissions with/without emissions, using baseline vs. project scenarios
• Monitored through intermittent 3rd party monitoring
• Produces: “Carbon Credits” - Units of emission reductions, in tons CO2 equivalent (tCO2)
• Finance through trading in voluntary (non-compliance) carbon markets
• Carbon accounting - National level (UNFCCC)
• Accounted using national carbon accounting systems that passed technical assessment by an
expert panel coordinated by the UNFCCC secretariat
• Monitored through self-reported biennial update reports/national communications to the
UNFCCC
• Finance through results-based payment mechanisms for jurisdictional REDD+, or bilateral
agreements

8. REDD+ Expectations – Estimated Emission Reductions (ER) Potential
• Forest loss and degradation: 15-20% of global GHG emissions
• Reversing forest loss/degradation: potent “natural climate solution” (Mitigation + Adaptation)
Source: Griscom et al., 2017
“Forest pathways offer over two‐thirds of cost‐
effective NCS mitigation needed to hold warming
to below 2 °C and about half of low‐cost mitigation
opportunities” (p. 11648)
“Natural climate solutions can provide 37% of cost‐
effective CO2 mitigation needed through 2030 for a
>66% chance of holding warming to below 2 °C.”
(Abstract)

9. REDD+ Project Realities – Meeting Expectations
• REDD+ projects < 1/40th the scale of its estimated ER potential
Source: Atmadja et al., 2022

10. REDD+ Realities – Project Numbers, Areas (2018-2020)
• 377 ongoing REDD+ projects. In 56 countries, covering 53 million ha (mha)
• Vs. 2.08 billion ha of forest cover in those countries
• Most, but not all, are in tropical countries
Source: Atmadja et al., 2022
Note: Dots show the approximate location of 377 projects

11. REDD+ Realities – Financing
• REDD+ Aid = USD 5.6 billion (2010-2019)
• REDD+ VCM to projects = USD 1.4billion (<2020)
0
1
2010 2015 2020
Committed,
USD
billion,
2010‐2019
Direct REDD+
0
100
200
2010 2015 2020
USD
Millions
Source: Atmadja & Pham, 2022

12. REDD+ Project Realities – Certification
• Main players
• Verra (VCS, CCB, JNR) –
industry leader
• Others: Plan Vivo, Gold
Standard
• Turns forest ‘action’ to forest
‘carbon’  tradable commodity
• For buyers: easiest (only?) way
to gauge quality
• Questions of additionality
• Inflated baselines (West et
al., 2020)
• Strategic site selection
(Badgely et al., 2021)
Source: Atmadja et al., 2022

13. REDD+ Project Realities – Market access
• Getting certified is half the
battle
• Half of VCS certified REDD+
projects can transact by 2020
• Many projects face >= 6 years
between start and 1st sale
Source: Atmadja et al., 2022
161 Verra and Plan Vivo‐certified projects that started between
2007 and 2017

14. REDD+ Project Realities – Market Entry
• Decline in new projects since 2011
• Money not coming on time? High expectations?
• ‘Good’ locations taken? Tougher certification?
• Fear of “nationalization” for achieving NDCs?
(Source: Atmadja et al., 2022)

15. REDD+ Outlooks – Rise of REDD+ Jurisdictional Approach
Jurisdictions are rising
• New financing sources: LEAF coalition ($1bn ready to go, public-private, min
$10/tCO2eq)
• Old financing sources – but more participants “graduate” into RBPs
• World Bank’s Forest Carbon Partnership Facility – Carbon Fund (FCPF-CF) –
USD 5/tCO2eq)
• New certification standards
• VCS’s Jurisdictional and Nested REDD+/JNR
• ART’s The REDD+ Environmental Excellence Standard/TREES
• New domestic carbon markets with REDD+
• Colombia – tax + trade
• TBC: Indonesia – carbon price legislated at IDR 30,000 (+/- USD 2) /tCO2eq

16. REDD+ Outlooks – Rise (?) of REDD+ projects
• 2022 ID-RECCO update (preliminary): Identified 100 new projects in past 2
years
• Largest proportion from Colombia
• Not sure yet how many existing projects ended
• New national registries for REDD+ projects
• Active: Colombia
• In development: Peru, Indonesia
• New standards
• Verra: SD Vista (for SDGs)

17. REDD+ Outlook: Nested Carbon
Accounting
• Issue:
• Projects that pre-exist
national accounting
methods
• Inconsistent methods
(VCM vs. UNFCC)
• Question:
• Payments to projects
when they are in an active
jurisdictional REDD+
program?
• ER accounting for NDCs?
• Cost of adjusting
accounting method?
Source: Atmadja et al., 2022

18. Reflections
• “Real” impact on people vs. biodiversity
• Impact evaluation on people or biodiversity – Rare compared to forest
carbon (Duchelle et al., 2018)
• How to verify claims on livelihoods and biodiversity?
• Parallel financing and accounting systems: Resilient? Inefficient?
• Role of countries: Enabler? Disabler?

19. Acknowledgments
• This research is part of CIFOR’s Global Comparative Study on REDD+ (www.cifor.org/gcs) with funding support from
the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (Norad), Norway’s International Climate and Forest Initiative
(NICFI), and the CGIAR Research Program on Forests, Trees and Agroforestry (CRP-FTA), with financial support
from the donors contributing to the CGIAR Fund.
• Co-authors of the Atmadja et al., 2022 article wish to thank Charlotte Petersen, Ellen Bruzelius Backer, Leif John
Fosse, Martin Herold and Patrick Behr, along with five anonymous reviewers for their questions, inputs and advice.
• I thank Eric Nowak, Patrick Behr for the invitation to this workshop, and USI’s generous support for my travel and
accommodations
References
Atmadja, S.S., Duchelle, A.E., De Sy, V., Selviana, V., Komalasari, M., Sills, E.O., Angelsen, A., 2022. How do REDD+ projects
contribute to the goals of the Paris Agreement? Environ. Res. Lett. 17, 044038. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748‐9326/ac5669
Duchelle, A.E., Simonet, G., Sunderlin, W.D., Wunder, S., 2018. What is REDD+ achieving on the ground? Current Opinion in
Environmental Sustainability 32, 134–140. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cosust.2018.07.001
Griscom, B.W., Adams, J., Ellis, P.W., Houghton, R.A., Lomax, G., Miteva, D.A., Schlesinger, W.H., Shoch, D., Siikamäki, J.V., Smith, P.,
Woodbury, P., Zganjar, C., Blackman, A., Campari, J., Conant, R.T., Delgado, C., Elias, P., Gopalakrishna, T., Hamsik, M.R., Herrero,
M., Kiesecker, J., Landis, E., Laestadius, L., Leavitt, S.M., Minnemeyer, S., Polasky, S., Potapov, P., Putz, F.E., Sanderman, J., Silvius,
M., Wollenberg, E., Fargione, J., 2017. Natural climate solutions. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 114, 11645–
11650. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1710465114

21. Thank you
foreststreesagroforestry.org | globallandscapesforum.org | resilientlandscapes.org
cifor.org | worldagroforestry.org
The Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) and World Agroforestry (ICRAF) envision a more equitable world where forestry
and landscapes enhance the environment and well‐being for all. CIFOR‐ICRAF are CGIAR Research Centers.

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