Takeaways from the Global Forum on Forest Governance 2022
Thiago Kanashiro Uehara takes a look at the highlights of the Global Forum on Forest Governance 2022.
Over 100 world leaders promised to end deforestation by 2030 at COP26 in Scotland last year. With less than six months left until COP27 in Egypt, Chatham House welcomed global experts to discuss the latest debates in forest governance.
Joined by more than 220 people, participants at the forum discussed everything from the role of responsible business and trade in supporting a legal and sustainable forest sector, to the development models needed to support transitioning to sustainable forest economies.
Businesspeople, government ministers, academics, civil society and indigenous leaders all shared their thoughts on how the world is doing in preserving biodiverse forests and what more needs to happen to meet key international human rights, climate and environmental targets going forwards.
Below we explore the three key themes that emerged from the two-day event.
Donors pledged $1.5 billion at COP26 to protect the forests of the Congo Basin in what was a strong signal for donor support of biodiverse forests which are the world’s biggest source of terrestrial biodiversity, critical for mitigating and adapting to climate change, a source of timber and other products and, crucially, the homes and livelihoods for millions of people.
However, without stronger forest governance that supports local sustainable development, this investment risks falling far short of its goal. Indeed, demands for the termination of colonial conservation is on the rise. In this vein, the forum ran two sessions on forest sector reform in Central Africa.
In the first session, Rigobert Minani, from the Centre d’Etudes pour l’Action Sociale, CEPAS, pointed out how far the forest sector still has to go in promoting sustainable development in the region. Experts from Cameroon and the DRC then shared their reflections on what needs to change to improve forest governance before Alfred Nkodia, from the Republic of Congo, explained how a rapidly rising population and numerous conflicts in the region are reducing usable forest space, increasing pressure on those spaces and, in turn, increasing the risk of conflict in what has become a vicious circle.
Participants agreed that authoritarian-imposed approaches have not worked and reforms need to be based on consultation that leads to a consensus between national and local governments as well as companies and communities. But, for Samuel Nguiffo, from Centre pour l’Environnement et le Développement, a Congo Basin network is not enough. More localized processes should be created, through which diverse stakeholders can express their needs and thereby co-design clear pathways for change.
Patrick Kipalu, of Rights and Resources Initiative, RRI, also explained how IPLCs have customary rights over half of the world’s land but only legally own one tenth of it. Indeed, participants expressed the need for more spaces for IPLCs to engage with donors particularly when it comes to funding architecture.
Dorothee Lisenga, from Coalition des Femmes Leaders pour l’Environnement et le Développement Durable, went on to explain the need to build alliances between international trade organizations, national governments and local communities so indigenous groups can access the $1.7 billion of funds pledged.
She also highlighted the role of women and indigenous people as stewards of the forests in the Congo Basin, describing how land grabbing from companies involved in gold mining are an urgent threat to tenure rights.
‘Women are the basis, the steward, the champion of these forests and indigenous peoples have been looking after these forests for millennia in a sustainable way,’ she said.
Lisenga went on to speak about the DRC's Forest Code, which is the first piece of legislation based on the concept of free, prior and informed consent, to ensure the involvement of local communities and indigenous peoples in forest governance processes. The Forest Code is a key step forward in preserving forests in the Congo Basin, protecting an area of forest larger than Great Britain.
Protecting the world’s largest rainforest is critical for preserving life-supporting ecosystems and slowing down climate breakdown. With deforestation continuing to accelerate at alarming rates in the Amazon, the final session of the first day of the forum discussed what approaches could be pursued to tackle deforestation, promote sustainable development and strengthen livelihoods in the region.
With the Brazilian election coming up in October this year, and COP27 due to take place shortly after, there has never been a more important time to look at promising pathways for forest governance in the Amazon. João Paulo Capobianco, from Brazil’s Instituto Democracia e Sustentabilidade, explored how rates of deforestation in the Amazon increased by 189 per cent between 2012-21. He proposed three areas for policymakers to prioritize: tackling deforestation and the loss of all natural resources, combating hunger and advocating for the production of food.
Marina Piato, from Imaflora, also explained the need for effective fiscal policy to disincentivize deforestation and conserve the Amazon.
Anthony Bebbington, from the Ford Foundation, then argued for a new development model of the Amazon that generates the support of a broad coalition of voters, community organizations, political parties and elites. In his view, parties to this coalition need to see that their interests are served by the Amazon and they must be motivated by the idea that a standing forest is something that’s valuable.
Bebbington also stressed the need to forge a new ‘forest narrative’ that mobilizes people around how interests can be served by the forest since narratives so far haven’t been strong enough to build broad constituencies and tackle forest loss.
Between 2012-20, 317 environmental defenders were killed in Brazil. Several experts, including Louise Nakagawa from Cebrap, commented on the crucial role of environmental defenders in protecting the environment and its institutions.
Francisco Piyãko, from the leadership of the Ashaninka people, also called for cooperation and information-sharing.
‘If we don’t have the support to strengthen indigenous populations, hand in hand with education, we will not be able to keep the forest alive,’ he explained.
Alongside international cooperation, he said, education is key for achieving climate targets and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
The illegal timber trade undermines sustainable forest management leading to deforestation and the loss of income for governments and their citizens. More than two thirds of recent tropical deforestation is estimated to have taken place illegally while illegality drives tens of millions of dollars in lost revenue each year.
In the first session of the second day of the forum, we heard about Indonesia’s experience in developing and implementing a national timber legality and sustainability system, known as SVLK. SVLK is a mandatory government scheme that requires all timber from state-owned and private forests to have legal verification to ensure that it comes from sustainable and legal sources.
Participants discussed SVLK approaches at the local level and how they could be scaled up and used as a model for other governments to follow. Dr Krisdianto Sugiyanto, from the Indonesian Ministry of Forestry, spoke about SVLK’s key measures of success which includes 12.7 million hectares of forests under community management, forest and land rehabilitation, a moratorium of peatland use and more. He also described how SVLK has contributed to an 80 per cent drop in deforestation since 2011.
However, Professor Dami Buchori from IPB, explained how there are still some interest groups that are not well represented in SVLK such as indigenous peoples. She called for further attention to land tenure and market integration which was echoed by others including Professor Constance McDermott who warned that, ‘We cannot assume that global legality is complementary to local empowerment.’
Mardi Minangsari, from Telepak, also called for a strengthening of independent monitoring and law enforcement to make SVLK the most effective it can be.
In a session discussing international commitments to tackling illegal logging, the 2021 agreement between the US and Vietnam was explored and what progress has been made since then.
The importance of cooperation across all levels and between all actors emerged as a key theme. Charles Barber, from World Resources Institutes (WRI) said how the agreement, ‘Sets a precedent for how the world goes forward looking at environment and trade.’
A veteran negotiator, Barber shared his thoughts on what makes a successful trade agreement, saying it was knowing, ‘What my counterpart most wants and what they most fear. If you’re serious about changing something, that’s what you have to look at.’
Xuan To, from Forest Trends, also spoke about how shifting trade patterns and increasing demand for sustainable and deforestation-free products could help tackle illegality in the region. Again, experts stressed the importance of collaboration between governments, the private sector and civil society.
With COP27 on the horizon, and rapidly escalating climate and biodiversity crises, now is the time for governments to double down on efforts to safeguard sustainable land use and adopt strong forest governance policies.
One of the strongest themes from across the two-day forum was the need for international aid and cooperation to prioritize co-created mechanisms for sustainable forestry, livelihoods and development. To truly enforce good forest governance, we must go beyond reforms in trade and supply chain mechanisms and set our sights on the transformative issues facing forests and forest communities. Global forest governance will get stronger once principles of subsidiarity, equity and inclusion are embedded in transformational dialogues and systems.
There is a long way to go, and this will require investment, not only in broadening the conversation to seriously consider local and regional development needs, but also effective finance flowing into the needs of the most vulnerable. This means looking at the whole system in terms of poverty eradication, food sovereignty, quality education, social, trade and land use policies.
This also means the decolonization of international affairs, embedding environmental justice into the SDGs and climate targets and the recognition that indigenous peoples and local communities are the rightful owners and custodians of their lands and their futures.
If you missed the forum, you can watch it here.