The United States and China announced renewed commitment to enhance cooperation to address the climate crisis in the Sunnylands Statement released on November 14, 2023 (the Statement). Both countries indicated their commitment to the effective implementation of the UNFCCC and the Paris Agreement, including the Glasgow Climate Pact and the Sharm el-Sheikh Implementation Plan, and to further the effective and sustained implementation of the U.S.-China Joint Statement Addressing the Climate Crisis and the U.S.-China Joint Glasgow Declaration on Enhancing Climate Action in the 2020s. This bulletin provides key details of the new and renewed commitments in the Statement. COP 28. The countries indicated that the consensus Global Stocktake decision expected to come out of COP 28 should, among other things: reflect that substantially more ambition and implementation on action and support will be needed to achieve the Paris Agreement’s goals; send signals with respect to the energy transition (renewable energy, coal/oil/gas), carbon sinks including forests, non-CO2 greenhouse gases (GHGs) including methane, and low-carbon technologies; encourage economy-wide 2035 Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) covering all GHGs; note the expectation of developed countries that the $100B climate finance goal will be met in 2023; welcome the recommendations of the Transitional Committee with respect to establishing funding arrangements to address loss and damage, including the establishment of a fund; and emphasize the important role of international cooperation. 2035 NDCs. The U.S. and China both affirmed that their 2035 NDCs under the Paris Agreement will be economy-wide, include all GHGs, and reflect emission reductions aligned with the Paris Agreement temperature goals. Energy Transition. The Statement provides important commitments related to the energy transition, including: support for the G20 Leaders Declaration to pursue efforts to triple renewable energy capacity globally by 2030 and sufficiently accelerate renewable energy deployment through 2030 from 2020 levels to accelerate the…
The recently launched Peoples Forests Partnership (the Partnership), aims to secure commitments to mobilize $20 billion per year by 2030 to Indigenous Peoples, traditional owners, and local communities (IPLCs) for community-based tropical forest conservation and restoration projects in the Global South. Facilitating members of the Partnership include Forest Trends, RECOFTC, Wildlife Works Carbon, Everland, and Green Collar. This Partnership could help reduce 2 billion tonnes of CO2 emissions from deforestation each year, protect 500 million hectares of threatened tropical forest, and support livelihoods and bioeconomy development for over 50 million people in forest communities. The Partnership was launched last year during the COP 26 conference in Glasgow, following an announcement of funding of $1.7B for IPLCs pledged by Norway, UK, US, Germany, and the Netherlands. The funding, to be provided through 2025, will support the capacity of IPLCs to govern themselves collectively, assist with mapping and registration work, back national land reform, and help resolve conflict over territories. The Partnership will support performance-based payments, such as carbon credits, and other climate funding mechanisms, including a financing facility specifically focused on strengthening territorial governance to be managed by Forest Trends. The Partnership is organized around two governing principles (i) forest communities are essential conservation partners; and (ii) community-based, values-driven climate and conservation finance projects have the potential to create a future with forests that aligns with forest community rights to their territories, economic self-determination, and cultural traditions. Facilitating members represent a collective portfolio that includes: over 250,000 Indigenous and other forest community members receiving direct market finance in recognition for protecting forests; over 2 million hectares of tropical forests with active climate finance projects; financing already in place for a portfolio of community-based forest conservation projects that will deploy $2 billion in private investment and stop 200 million tonnes of deforestation emissions…
The Ecosystem Marketplace, an initiative of Forest Trends, in collaboration with the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility of the World Bank, yesterday released its report on the state of forest carbon finance in 2021 titled “A Green Growth Spurt: State of Forest Carbon Finance 2021” (the Report). The Report indicates that forest carbon financing remains inadequate to support increased climate ambition and counter global deforestation, noting that 23% of all anthropogenic GHG emissions are a result of the inefficient and destructive use of forests, farms, and fields. This bulletin summarizes the Report’s key findings: Funding for forests. Funding for forests through carbon markets and results-based payments for REDD+ has more than doubled since 2017, including $5.9 billion to forest carbon offset projects and an additional $1.3 billion for “REDD+ readiness” in developing countries. Compliance-driven forest carbon markets. Compliance carbon markets have provided over $3.9 billion to forests and sustainable land use. This is expected to further increase as a result of new compliance mechanisms such as CORSIA and the still-to-be-finalized markets provisions under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement. Natural climate solutions. From 2017-2019, approximately $400 million was generated in transactions through global voluntary carbon markets (VCM), representing 105 MtCO2e of carbon credits from forest and land use natural climate solutions (NCS), as well as generating an overall transaction value of over $1 billion in demand for NCS offsets. Voluntary carbon markets. The Taskforce on Scaling Voluntary Carbon Markets (TSVCM) estimates that VCMs must grow 15-fold by 2030 and 100-fold by 2050 to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement (read our earlier bulletins on the TSVCM here and here). The Report notes that most forest carbon offset buyers in VCMs are concentrated in Europe and the US, with companies in France and the UK accounting for almost a third of all offsets purchased in 2019. …