In recent years, many countries have expressed a willingness and demonstrated the capability to increase forest cover and restore degraded landscapes. As of 2018, pledges had reached upwards of 168 million hectares. The latest confirmation of this growing momentum can be seen in the recent UN General Assembly’s declaration of the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration 2021–2030 which will help countries fight against the impact of climate change and biodiversity loss. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the UN Environment Programme will lead the implementation; of the decade with countries and partners. However, the question remains about...

Representatives from Austria and the Democratic Republic of the Congo gathered in Vienna to share good practices and lessons learned on meeting reporting requirements under the Enhanced Transparency Framework of the Paris Agreement. The meeting was organized as part of the Central African Forest Initiative (CAFI) activities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo with technical support from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).  As the urgency to tackle the current climate crisis is growing, countries are getting ready to report on their national greenhouse gas inventories (GHGIs) under the Katowice Rulebook adopted at the 24th Conference...

A two-day kick-off workshop took place in Dakar, Senegal on 24 – 25 July to kick off the activities under the project “Global transformation of forests for people and climate: A focus on West Africa”. Supported by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida), and implemented by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the five-year project aims at protecting West Africa's forests and safeguarding the livelihoods of millions of people who depend on them. The workshop gathered representatives from ECOWAS member states as well as participants from ECOWAS...

Aiming to address gender inequalities and strengthen women’s contributions to the planning of national climate action, Equatorial Guinea organized a national workshop with the participation of 53 women representing various sectors and social groups. Held on 5 July, the workshop complemented an ongoing participatory process to develop the country programme for the Green Climate Fund (GCF), which defines the national priorities to contribute to the global fight against climate change, and ways to translate these priorities into projects to be submitted to the GCF. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) provides technical support to the process and,...

FAO is organizing a live demo of the new version of System for Earth Observation Data Access, Processing and Analysis for Land Monitoring (SEPAL). The webinar will be hosted in both English and French and will be available at the following link: http://fao.adobeconnect.com/sepal/ In English – Thursday, 11 July, 14:00 CEST In French – Friday, 12 July, 14:00 CEST The session will demonstrate the new SEPAL features and review the basics of using the platform to create optical and radar mosaics, as well as image classification. The webinar will include an interactive Q&A session with SEPAL experts Erik Lindquist and Remi D’Annunzio. The webinar will...