COP21 Paris snapshot #1: REDD

Last night at 21:00 a new version of the Draft Paris Outcome was released at COP21 in Paris. It’s down to 27 pages and has only 50 pairs of square brackets. That’s the good news. The rest is practically all bad news.

Of course fossil fuels aren’t mentioned anywhere in the text. The words “oil” and “coal” don’t appear. The word “gas” appears 24 times, but only in the context of “greenhouse gas emissions”, rather than the fossil fuel, natural gas.

The word “forest” appears four times, “forests” five times, and “deforestation” twice. The abbreviation “REDD” isn’t mentioned, but it appears as “reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation” twice.

REDD in version 1 of the Draft Paris Outcome

Here’s version of the “REDD paragraph” (Article 3 bis) as it appeared in the 9 December 2015 version (page 5):

[Article 3 bis] (REDD-PLUS)
 
1. Parties are encouraged to conserve and enhance, as appropriate, sinks and reservoirs of GHG as referred to in Article 4 paragraph 1(d) of the Convention.
 
2. Parties are encouraged to incentivize,[including by scaling up resources] the reduction of emissions from deforestation and forest degradation and to promote the conservation and sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks in developing countries, while enhancing the non-carbon benefits; and to support alternative policy approaches, such as joint mitigation and adaption approaches for the integral and sustainable management of forests, including alleviating poverty and building ecosystem resilience, in accordance with previous COP decisions related to forests.

On the evening of 9 December 2015, countries commented on the previous version (which had removed the word “mechanism”) of the draft text in a plenary session. (The more than three-hours-long plenary session can be watched here. Apparently the room smelled of chipboard and sweat.)

One after another countries from the Coalition for Rainforest Nations asked that the words “REDD-plus mechanism” be put back in text.

Climate Tracker took notes of the reactions to the draft text. Here are the reactions to the way REDD is mentioned in the text:

REDD in version 2 of the Draft Paris Outcome

On 10 December 2015 at 21:00 version 2 of the Draft Paris Outcome was released. Here’s the “REDD paragraph” (page 18-19):

Article 3 bis
 
1. Parties should take action to conserve and enhance, as appropriate, sinks and reservoirs of greenhouse gas as referred to in Article 4, paragraph 1(d), of the Convention.
 
2. Parties may take action to implement and support, including by scaling up resources, policy approaches and positive incentives for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, and the role of conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks in developing countries; as well as alternative policy approaches, such as joint mitigation and adaptation approaches for the integral and sustainable management of forests; while reaffirming the importance of non-carbon benefits associated with such approaches; as set out in related guidance and decisions already agreed under the Convention.

Here are the changes between the two versions:

• Version 2 states that parties “should” take action to conserve and enhance sinks. (In version 1 they were “encouraged” to do so.)
• Version 2 states that partis “may take action to implement and support” REDD. (In version 1 they were “encouraged to incentivize” REDD.)
• In version 2, “scaling up resources” is no longer in square brackets.
• In version 2, the words “policy approaches and positive incentives” have been added.
• Version 2 states, “while reaffirming the importance of non-carbon benefits associated with such approaches”. (Version 1 stated, “while enhancing the non-carbon benefits”.)
• Version 2 states, “as well as alternative policy approaches”. (Version 1 stated, “and to support alternative policy approaches”.)
• In version 2, the words, “including alleviating poverty and building ecosystem resilience”, have been deleted.

REDD also appears in a paragraph about Finance (Page 6 – in the Decision part of the text, as apposed to the Agreement, which is an Annex to the Draft Paris Outcome):

60. Also decides that adequate, predictable and sustainable financial resources, including for results-based payments, as appropriate, shall be provided for the implementation of policy approaches and positive incentives for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, and the role of conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement of forest carbon stocks; as well as alternative policy approaches, such as joint mitigation and adaptation approaches for the integral and sustainable management of forests; while reaffirming the importance of non-carbon benefits associated with such approaches; pursuing the coordination of support to, inter alia, public and private sources, including the Green Climate Fund in accordance with relevant decisions by the Conference of the Parties;

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius, President of COP21, says that the final text of the Paris Outcome will be presented one day late, on Saturday morning (12 December 2015).