Uganda Submitted REDD+ Results | 30 Jun 2020

Recently, Uganda has become the first African country to submit results for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD+) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

REDD+

Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD+) is a mechanism developed by Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in 2005.
Most of the key REDD+ decisions were completed by 2013, with the final pieces of the rulebook finished in 2015.
The “Plus” in REDD+, lays out the various ways in which countries have defined the three activities: conservation, the sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stock.
It aims to achieve climate change mitigation by incentivizing forest conservation.
It has three phases — Readiness, Implementation and Result-based actions.
- Readiness phase involves the development of national strategies or action plans, REDD+ mitigation actions, and capacity building.
- Implementation is about enacting REDD+ actions and national strategies that could involve further capacity building, technology development and transfer.
- Results-based payments comprise the final REDD+ phase.
  - It provides financial incentives to developing countries that prove they stopped deforestation during a certain period of time. This is done through rigorous UN-backed technical evaluations
  - The Green Climate Fund (GCF) established at Conference Of Parties (COP)-17 to function as the financial mechanism for the UNFCCC, is currently financing REDD+ programs.
  - Brazil was the first country to receive $96.5 million under the results-based payments.

Uganda's REDD+ Results: There is a 44% reduction in the country’s rate of deforestation annually between 2015 and 2017.
- The results submission by Uganda to the UNFCCC has paved the way for potential results-based payments to the country.
- It will help Uganda to receive funds through the Green Climate Fund’s forest conservation scheme.
Significance for Africa: The submission of the results are a significant development on REDD+ for Africa. This will encourage other African countries to reduce carbon emissions by decreasing deforestation and forest degradation.
India and REDD+:
- The Paris agreement on climate change called upon country Parties to take action to implement and support REDD+.
- India has communicated in its Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) under Paris Agreement, that it will capture 2.5 to 3 billion tonnes of Carbon dioxide through additional forest and tree cover by 2030.
- In this regard, India has prepared its “National REDD+ Strategy”.
  - Introduced in 2018 by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, the strategy seeks to address drivers of deforestation and forest degradation and also develop a roadmap for enhancement of forest carbon stocks and achieving sustainable management of forests through REDD+ actions.

Achieving REDD+ results are challenging, as there are other development priorities — with agriculture, mining, energy and forestry — driving deforestation.
There is a need to support developing countries through all three REDD+ phases — readiness, implementation and result-based actions — by providing tools and analysis of how to design, implement and measure the results of REDD+ action.
This will in turn position countries like India and Africa as the forest champion of the next decade.