REMINDER: There is one week left to register for the upcoming virtual launch of the refreshed NYDF on October 13, 2021 from 9:00 to 10:30 AM EST | 13:00 to 14:30 UTC | 21:00 to 23:00 UTC+8.

This event will:

• Summarize alterations to the Declaration and the NYDF Global Platform informed by the collaborative "refresh" process

• Review key findings from the upcoming NYDF Assessment Report

• Reflect on the value of this global, multi-stakeholder framework for forests and its coalition of endorsers as a driver of forest action in this next critical decade and beyond

Panelists and participants will include members of the NYDF Global Platform and NYDF Assessment, NYDF endorsers, senior officials from donor and forest countries, bi-lateral and multi-lateral donors, and senior staff from environmental organizations and companies.

RECORDATORIO: Queda una semana para inscribirse en el próximo lanzamiento virtual del renovado NYDF el 13 de octubre de 2021 de 9:00 a 10:30 AM EST | 13:00 a 14:30 UTC | 21:00 a 23:00 UTC+8.

En este evento:

• Resumir las modificaciones de la Declaración y de la Plataforma Global del NYDF, basadas en el proceso de colaboración de "actualización"
• Examinar las principales conclusiones del próximo informe de evaluación del progreso del NYDF
• Reflexionar sobre el valor de este marco mundial de múltiples partes interesadas para los bosques y su coalición de partidarios como motor de la acción forestal en esta próxima década crítica y más allá.

Entre los panelistas y participantes se encontrarán miembros de la Plataforma Global del NYDF y de la Evaluación del NYDF, avalistas del NYDF, altos funcionarios de países donantes y forestales, donantes bilaterales y multilaterales, y personal directivo de organizaciones y empresas medioambientales.

RAPPEL: Il ne reste plus qu'une semaine pour s'inscrire au prochain lancement virtuel du nouveau NYDF le 13 octobre 2021 de 9h00 à 10h30 EST | 13h00 à 14h30 UTC | 21h00 à 23h00 UTC+8.

Dans cet événement :

• Résumer les modifications apportées à la Déclaration et à la Plate-forme mondiale du NYDF suite au processus collaboratif de " rafraîchissement "
• Examiner les principales conclusions du prochain rapport d'évaluation des progrès du NYDF
• Réfléchir à la valeur de ce cadre mondial multipartite pour les forêts et de sa coalition d'adhérents en tant que moteur de l'action forestière au cours de la prochaine décennie critique et au-delà.

Les panélistes et les participants comprendront des membres de la Plate-forme mondiale et de l'évaluation du NYDF, des partisans du NYDF, des hauts fonctionnaires des pays donateurs et des pays forestiers, des donateurs bilatéraux et multilatéraux, et des cadres supérieurs d'organisations et d'entreprises environnementales.

LEMBRETE: Falta uma semana para a inscrição no próximo lançamento virtual do NYDF renovado em 13 de Outubro de 2021 das 9:00 às 10:30 EST | 13:00 às 14:30 UTC | 21:00 às 23:00 UTC+8.

Neste caso:

• Resumir alterações à Declaração e à Plataforma Global de NYDF informadas pelo processo de "atualização" colaborativa
• Revisar as principais conclusões do próximo Relatório de Avaliação de Progresso da NYDF
• Refletir sobre o valor desta estrutura global e multi-stakeholder para as florestas e sua coalizão de endossadores como um motor da ação florestal nesta próxima década crítica e além

Os membros do painel e participantes incluirão membros da Plataforma Global da NYDF e da Avaliação da NYDF, endossadores da NYDF, funcionários superiores de países doadores e países florestais, doadores bilaterais e multilaterais, e pessoal superior de organizações e empresas ambientais.

Thank you for attending the virtual launch of the refreshed New York Declaration on Forests!

The event was a tremendous success filled with critical insights from the outstanding panelists and speakers. We were joined by:

• members of the NYDF Global Platform and NYDF Assessment to provide an overview of updates from the collaborative "refresh" process;
• John Hixon, Yum! Brands and Sarah Lake, Feed The Truth who reflected on the collaborative refresh process and the impact of the updated Declaration on their continued efforts in this work;
• keynote speaker, Roberto Múkaro Borrero, with an essential reminder of the need to integrate a human rights framework into the NYDF and a call to respect and protect Indigenous Peoples as the rightful stewards of forests;
• several NYDF endorsers who shared on-the-ground progress and implementation of the newly revised NYDF Goals, continued challenges, and emphasized the need for collective action;
  • Edu Effiom, Cross River State Forestry Commission
  • Jennifer Koinante, Yiaku Laikipiak Trust
  • Silvia Llama, Pronatura Sur A.C.
  • Pablo Montoya Dávila, Grupo Éxito
  • Ms. Glenda Ortega, Ministry of Environment, Water and Ecological Transition of Ecuador
• and a passionate closing by Martha Isabela "Pati" Ruiz-Corzo on the need to go forth with bold new strategies in the fight against deforestation rooted in a deep sense of love and respect for the Earth and future generations.

You can find a full recording here and the PowerPoint slides from the session here.

To read more about the refresh process and updates to the NYDF Declaration, visit https://forestdeclaration.org/a-renewed-call-to-action/

The COP Presidency and the Nature 4 Climate Coalition have organized November 6th as Nature Day.
(See full COP26 programme here for more details.)

Emerging Policy Approaches For Intact Forest Conservation

Saturday, November 6 | 17:00-18:30 GMT
(Click here to register)

SDG 15 Event: High-level Dialogue of the Collaborative Partnership on Forests: Upscaling Actions to Turn the Tide on Deforestation
Saturday, November 6
(Click here for more details)
 
Marrakech Partnership: Land Use Action Event
Saturday, November 6
(Click here for more details)

Progress toward 2030 forest goals

Only eight years remain to achieve the twin global goals of halting and reversing deforestation by 2030. Despite encouraging signs, not a single global indicator is on track to meet these 2030 goals of stopping forest loss and degradation and restoring 350 million hectares of forest landscape.

The 2022 Forest Declaration Assessment sheds a stark light on the state of global forest commitments but offers hope that achieving the 2030 forest goals is possible. The Assessment is presented as series of four reports on Overarching forest goals (Theme 1), Sustainable production and development (Theme 2), Finance for forests (Theme 3), and Forest governance (Theme 4)—all summarized in an Executive Summary.

Overarching forest goals

To be on course to halt deforestation completely by 2030, a 10 percent annual reduction is needed. However, deforestation rates around the world declined only modestly, in 2021, by 6.3 percent compared to the 2018-20 baseline. In the humid tropics, loss of irreplaceable primary forest decreased by only 3.1 percent.

Globally, forests became more degraded in 2021, but more slowly than during the 2018-20 baseline period; if continued, this slowdown may in time put the world on track to meet the 2030 target.

Tropical Asia is the only region currently on track to halt deforestation by 2030. While deforestation rates in Tropical Latin America and Africa decreased in 2021 relative to the 2018-20 baseline, those reductions are still insufficient to meet the 2030 goal.

Notable progress in afforestation and reforestation efforts over the last two decades have resulted in new forest new forest areas the size of Peru, with net gains of forest cover in 36 countries. However, overall losses exceeded gains over the same period, resulting in a net loss of 100 million hectares globally.

The building blocks for progress

Forest goals enshrined in the New York Declaration on Forests, the Glasgow Leaders’ Declaration on Forests and Land Use, the Bonn Challenge, and other pledges recognize that halting deforestation and restoring forests requires a wide array of actors and the need to balance environmental, social, and economic interests. These goals provide the most concrete statements of global ambition to protect and restore forests – which are critical to meeting the aspirations of the Paris Agreement, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and many other global ambitions.

The accompanying reports from this Assessment—focused on sustainable production and development (Theme 2); finance for forests (Theme 3); and forest governance (Theme 4)—highlight critical actions that a variety of stakeholders must enact to meet their forests goals. Governments, companies, and civil society must collaborate to accelerate forest action, supported by transparency and accountability. Governments must carefully consider whether voluntary action is a viable foundation to achieve the 2030 forest goals, and how the role of mandatory action, disclosure, and accountability should be increased. Meanwhile, companies need to urgently increase the scope and stringency of corporate action, whether voluntary or mandated. A variety of private sector actors—companies, financial institutions, and philanthropies—have not yet leveraged their significant power to steer development and commodity production onto a sustainable trajectory in line with forest goals.

Additionally, funding for forests will need to dramatically increase – by up to 200 times – to meet 2030 goals. Indigenous Peoples and local communities, who are the most effective stewards and guardians of their forest territories, receive far less funding than their estimated finance needs for securing tenure rights and preserving forest ecosystems. Financial institutions and companies across sectors must recognize and act on the inherent business risks presented by deforestation and forest degradation and put in place measures and policies to combat this risk. Public sector actors must take concrete and far-reaching steps to implement and expand their finance commitments and align fiscal and financial policies with forest goals. Where private sector actors choose to invest in nature conservation and restoration, they must ensure that they are supporting high-quality and high-integrity interventions in line with the mitigation hierarchy and science-based targets.

Translations of the Executive Summary into Spanish, Portuguese, French, and Indonesian Bahasa are now available!

About the Assessment:

The Forest Declaration Assessment is a continual and collaborative process achieved collectively by civil society organizations and researchers, known as the Forest Declaration Assessment Partners. Previously the NYDF Progress Assessment, the Forest Declaration Assessment has since 2015 published annual updates on progress toward global forest goals. All assessment findings undergo a rigorous peer review process conducted by experts across the globe. Click here to learn more about the Forest Declaration Assessment.

Only eight years remain to achieve the twin global goals of halting and reversing deforestation by 2030. Despite encouraging signs, not a single global indicator is on track to meet these 2030 goals of of stopping forest loss and degradation and restoring 350 million hectares of forest landscape.

The 2022 Forest Declaration Assessment sheds a stark light on the state of global forest commitments but offers hope that achieving the 2030 forest goals is possible. The Assessment is presented as series of four reports on Overarching forest goals (Theme 1), Sustainable production and development (Theme 2), Finance for forests (Theme 3), and Forest governance (Theme 4)—all summarized in an Executive Summary.

Global demand for soft commodities like food and timber, and for mined commodities like fossil fuels and mined materials, continues to drive expansion of agriculture, extractive industries, and other land uses into forests. Deforestation is often enabled by the establishment of infrastructure, intentionally or unintentionally opening access to forests. The gravest forest risk comes from so-called megaprojects, which combine multiple types of transportation and energy infrastructure, along with sites of agricultural commodity production, natural resource extraction, and planned urbanization. Such projects are currently underway or planned in all major tropical forest regions.

Forests are under threat not only from global markets, but also from growing demand due to populations in forest areas and urban centers. Billions of people, particularly Indigenous Peoples and local communities (IPs and LCs), rely on forests for their subsistence or pursue small-scale commercial activities that sustain livelihoods. These activities, too, can lead to deforestation or permanent degradation when demand pressure outpaces the rate of regeneration.

Findings

We are not on track to achieve the private sector goal to eliminate deforestation from agricultural supply chains by 2025. Commodity-driven tree cover loss declined by 6 percent in 2021 compared to previous years (2018-20), but deforestation rates are still higher than in any year before 2016 and are far from the trajectory (20% reduction per year) needed to reach the 2025 target (see Figure).

Almost all national governments have adopted ambitious forest goals under the Sustainable Development Agenda 2030 indicating broad alignment with the aim of achieving sustainable production and development. Dozens of developing countries have forest strategies in the context of REDD+ (reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation), laying the groundwork for important reforms—and, in some cases, driving important policy changes. In most cases, however, these programs have not yet yielded a reduction in deforestation, and only a handful of countries have received payments for forest emission reductions. 

In most countries, governments have yet to make the bold sectoral reforms needed to protect forests. There is limited transparency on how policymakers integrate forest goals into their decision-making, and how they seek to avoid and mitigate forest risks across economic sectors. Land use policies – such as fiscal incentives, environmental and social impact assessments, and protected area regulations – often fail to integrate forest concerns, have loopholes in their design, or are weakly enforced. Even governments that have adopted “green growth” agendas still struggle to invest in economic growth that is aligned with forest goals.

Figure: Commodity driven deforestation, in million hectares, and the pathway toward 2025

Encouragingly, development interventions such as community forestry, payments for environmental services schemes, and extension services for farmers can address both poverty reduction and deforestation and forest degradation. However, there are very few examples of government-led poverty reduction programs that both prioritize forest impacts and are implemented at scale. An analysis of 23 countries found that most have community or collective forestry schemes in place, but only a few provide robust land tenure or promote economic development.

Similarly, the agriculture sector has not made sufficient progress in reducing deforestation from agricultural commodity production. Since the first NYDF Progress Assessment report in 2016, we have seen little progress removing deforestation from supply chains (NYDF Goal 2), and the transformative potential of voluntary company action has not yet been realized. To date, only a quarter of major global companies in the sector have announced a clear, comprehensive, and ambitious policy to eliminate deforestation from their supply chains; of those, only a few have made significant progress on implementation. Less than 20 percent of companies disclosing to CDP report near complete compliance with their zero deforestation commitments.

Corporate action in the extractives sector also remains limited. In response to investor demand, most mining companies have now adopted some form of corporate social responsibility or environmental, social, and governance approach, but these frameworks rarely include an explicit focus on forests. The pace of implementing responsible mining practices" by leading companies has slowed since 2020 compared to the proceeding years. Few companies have adopted voluntary mining sector sustainability standards that require them to address direct, indirect, and cumulative forest impacts. The mining sector recently made positive strides by adopting policies and standards that address biodiversity impacts, but overall transparency and actions to address forest impacts still lag significantly behind the agriculture sector. IPs and LCs stand at the forefront of grassroots environmentalism despite significant risks. IPs and LCs often work together with civil society organizations, smallholder farmer coalitions, and women’s networks to combat threats to forests from development projects, extractives, or agricultural expansion. These actors employ various forms of social resistance, but with limited success – only 1 in 10 bottom-up mobilizations against environmentally destructive and socially conflictive projects are successful in stopping their target project. These successes come at a cost: 200 land and environmental defenders were killed in 2021, and the mining and extractives sector is consistently ranked as one of the deadliest for defenders.

Recommendations

To ensure that 2025 and 2030 do not pass as 2020 did – with limited progress toward global forest goals – governments, companies, and civil society must collaborate to accelerate forest action, supported by transparency and accountability.

The Forest Declaration Assessment Partners urge the endorsers of the Glasgow Leaders’ Declaration, as well as other pledgers, to ensure full transparency on the implementation of pledges, so that progress can be tracked and pledgers held accountable. Pledgers must all set clear interim milestones and provide publicly accessible reporting.

Public, private, and grassroots actors must prioritize collaboration to leverage relative roles and strengths to meet the 2025 target for commodity-driven deforestation. Where certain geographies and supply chains have achieved reductions, the credit can usually be shared between government mandates, company action, and civil society and grassroots initiatives. All actors should accelerate implementation of multifunctional landscape and jurisdictional programs that take an integrative, inclusive, and collaborative approach to addressing forest risks and impacts while driving sustainable economic growth.

Governments must carefully consider whether voluntary action is a viable foundation to achieve the 2030 forest goals, and how the role of mandatory action, disclosure, and accountability should be increased. Despite the exceptional success of a few privately led initiatives—notably the Amazon Soy Moratorium, which has led to lasting and substantial deforestation reductions—voluntary actions alone have not sufficiently shifted the trajectory of forest loss.

• To meet their own voluntary pledges and targets, governments should adopt and enforce stronger mandates for forest protection and sustainable management. Interventions could include binding due diligence regulations and mandatory disclosure, moratoria, increased regulation of protected areas, and recognition and respect for Indigenous territories including mandatory Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC). These mandates should be robust and science-based, covering all forest-risk commodities, legal and illegal deforestation, and addressing human rights and IPs and LCs’ rights.
• The critical role of global commodity trading companies, which source and trade a disproportionate volume of forest-risk commodities, must be recognized and leveraged to achieve concrete progress at scale. Governments should implement regulations and legislation targeting these actors, complemented by clear conditions for and from financial institutions.
• Governments should apply a forest lens to interventions designed to increase prosperity and reduce poverty; “greening” poverty interventions can increase their effectiveness by maintaining and improving the contribution of forest ecosystem services to rural livelihoods.
• Across the extractive, infrastructure, and agricultural sectors, regulations should mandate that forest risks identified for any development project must be managed by applying the mitigation hierarchy, with the first step – avoidance – applied as much as possible, accounting for other priorities for sustainable development. Governments should also enforce strict “no-go” zones for extractive industries and infrastructure in high-value forest ecosystems.
• For extractive industries, governments should also strengthen the regulatory processes for prospecting, exploration, and licensing mining activities. Environmental and social impact assessments should be required to be conducted early in the mining life cycle and to assess indirect and cumulative project impacts.
• Across all sectors, governments must empower civil society, smallholders, and, in particular, IPs and LCs, who have traditionally been the strongest constituencies for forests. Governments need to ensure meaningful participation in decision-making, design, and implementation processes by affected rights-holders, including ensuring the right to FPIC. Affected rights-holders include those whose customary forest lands and livelihoods are affected and organizations who advocate for the rights of nature.

Companies need to urgently increase the scope and stringency of corporate action, whether voluntary or mandated. Companies who wish to lead the charge toward the 2025 and 2030 forest goals should advocate at local, national, and international levels for holistic approaches to addressing deforestation; approaches where corporate action is enabled and supported by appropriate legislative and policy frameworks, trade standards, and financial instruments and incentive structures.

• Agricultural companies should strive to follow the best available guidance for removing deforestation from their supply chains and should adopt best practices set by sustainability standards.
• Sectoral bodies like trade and commodity associations should expand their efforts to include domestic markets and small- and medium enterprises into the zero-deforestation and zero-conversion supply chain movement to reach a critical share of market coverage for all forest-risk commodities.
• Extractive companies, and those sourcing from them, should adopt biodiversity commitments and policies that explicitly state that forest impacts from company operations at and beyond the mine site, and company-wide, must be addressed using the mitigation hierarchy. They must then embed the necessary processes and mechanisms in their standard operations to realize these commitments, including monitoring and reporting systems.
• Mining sector sustainability schemes should require site operators and downstream purchasers to assess and manage not just the direct forest impacts of extraction, but the indirect and cumulative as well.
• Companies in the extractives supply chain should also consider the opportunities of conducting forest conservation and restoration activities, through a nature-based solutions lens, to mitigate business risks, achieve company climate and biodiversity targets, and provide benefits to affected stakeholders.

Only eight years remain to achieve the twin global goals of halting and reversing deforestation by 2030. Despite encouraging signs, not a single global indicator is on track to meet these 2030 goals of of stopping forest loss and degradation and restoring 350 million hectares of forest landscape.

The 2022 Forest Declaration Assessment sheds a stark light on the state of global forest commitments but offers hope that achieving the 2030 forest goals is possible. The Assessment is presented as series of four reports on Overarching forest goals (Theme 1), Sustainable production and development (Theme 2), Finance for forests (Theme 3), and Forest governance (Theme 4) -- all summarized in an Executive Summary.

Large-scale, top down development projects threaten tropical forests and bring few benefits for local communities. The 2020 NYDF Assessment report examine progress toward Goals 3 & 4.

The 2020 NYDF Progress Assessment report on Goals 3 & 4 assesses progress on global efforts to end forest loss from infrastructure, mining, and other extractive industries (Goal 3) while supporting sustainable and prosperous livelihoods for forest-dependent communities, smallholders, small-scale miners (Goal 4). The report offers a stark picture of the threat that planned infrastructure corridors pose to remaining intact tropical forests, even as they are unlikely to deliver benefits to forest communities. 

Current levels of government, corporate, and financial transparency are not enough to stem the tide of harmful development. A fundamental realignment of economic development - away from consumption and exploitation, and toward alternative models - is needed to meet the world's ambitious forest and climate goals.

2020 is a crucial year for review of and reflection on forest goals for the NYDF and the global community. NYDF Goal 1 calls for halving the rate of natural forest loss by 2020. But instead, since the NYDF was launched in 2014, the rate of natural forest loss has increased. Ending natural forest loss by 2030 will require a rapid paradigm shift by the global community towards valuing forests for their essential benefits and prioritizing their protection. The 2020 NYDF Progress Assessment focuses on two complementary goals for achieving sustainable development: Goals 3 & 4.

This report is the result of a collaborative effort of the NYDF Assessment Partners, other key research partners, and countless individuals who contributed data, time, and feedback. CDP served as a Data Partner for this report. Other important and original research was conducted by Imaflora, The Alliance of Biodiversity International and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (Bioversity-CIAT Alliance), Climate Focus, and the team at [email protected] led by Anthony Bebbington and Denise Humphreys Bebbington. The report also drew from the 2019 Forest-Smart Mining reports commissioned by the World Bank and delivered by a consortium including Fauna & Flora International, Levin Sources, Fairfields Consulting, and Swedish Geological AB.

This project is supported by the Climate and Land Use Alliance (CLUA), the Good Energies Foundation, and the International Climate Initiative (IKI) of the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU) on the basis of a decision adopted by the German Bundestag via the NYDF Global Platform.

The initial NYDF Assessment report, published in 2015, proposes a framework of indicators to track progress toward each of the ten goals of the NYDF.

The report, “Progress on the New York Declaration on Forests: An assessment framework and initial report” seeks to fill the gap of the original NYDF, which launched without a process or methodology that would allow monitoring progress toward achieving its goals.

One year after the adoption of the NYDF is too early to draw conclusions about progress in most areas. But in the past year, new initiatives have been launched, additional commitments have been made, and implementation of relevant programs has begun. These are important steps in the right direction and may help accelerate trends toward achieving the NYDF goals. Still, overall progress remains slow and more action is urgently needed.

Five years after the launch of the NYDF, there is little evidence that its goals are on track, and achieving the 2020 NYDF targets is likely impossible. The 2019 NYDF Assessment report assesses progress toward all ten goals of the NYDF, five years after the Declaration's launch.

In September 2014, a broad coalition of governments, companies, civil society, and indigenous peoples’ organizations endorsed the New York Declaration on Forests (NYDF). 

Driven by the shared understanding that halting deforestation is essential to keep temperature increases below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, the endorsers adopted an ambitious declaration detailing ten goals. By committing to the ten goals of the declaration, endorsers have agreed to work toward halving tropical deforestation by 2020 and ending it by 2030. The NYDF also calls for the restoration of 150 million hectares of degraded landscapes and forestlands by 2020 and 350 million hectares by 2030.

Five years later, there is little evidence that these goals are on track, and achieving the 2020 NYDF targets is likely impossible.

The 2020 NYDF Assessment Report takes a stark look at trends across all ten goals of the NYDF and find progress to be wanting.

This report was supported by the Climate and Land Use Alliance (CLUA), the Good Energies Foundation, and the International Climate Initiative (IKI) of the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU) on the basis of a decision adopted by the German Bundestag via the NYDF Global Platform.

A fundamental realignment of economic pathways and incentives is needed.

Governments must
• Implement alternative development pathways that are less dependent on resource exploitation in natural ecosystems
• Ensure that land use planning processes are transparent and inclusive
• Strengthen and enforce environmental regulations for these sectors

Companies must
• Collaborate within and across sectors to address direct, indirect, and cumulative risks for forests and IPLCs
• Establish and report against timebound and specific forest commitments
• Fully respect IPLC rights in line with international best practice

Financial actors and institutions must
• Align financing and investments with forest goals
• Adopt, respect, and report on safeguards that consider direct, indirect, and cumulative risks for forests and IPLCs.
• Divest from projects in contention with sustainable development goals