Accelerating innovation for forest data transparency

Overview

This event will highlight the role of technical innovation and novel capacity development approaches in enabling country participation in the implementation of Article 13 Enhanced Transparency Framework of the Paris Agreement.  

The Enhanced Transparency Framework (ETF) of the Paris Agreement provides a framework to track and report on climate actions. Countries report on the implementation and achievements through Biennial Transparency Reports with the first submission due by 31 December 2024. Technological innovation has improved our ability to monitor the world’s forests and is accelerating forest data transparency as a direct contribution to ETF implementation. 
 
FAO’s Open Foris open-source solutions for environmental monitoring contributes to countries' national forest monitoring systems (NFMS), and their ability to transparently report forest data provision for the ETF. Innovative capacity development initiatives (Forest Monitoring for Climate Action e-learning) are also supporting NFMS strengthening and ETF preparations.  

Brazil, Indonesia and the Democratic Republic of Congo are pioneers in deploying innovation for forest data transparency. Brazil is a world leader in forest monitoring and is transparently sharing forest data through their Terrabrasilis platform. Indonesia has developed the award-winning SIMONTANA platform and the Democratic Republic of the Congo is sharing forest data through their NFMS portal. The three countries will present their innovative forest data platforms, as well as new approaches to national forest inventory, and discuss their progress toward the ETF. 

The United Kingdom/FAO project “Accelerating Innovative Monitoring for Forests” (AIM4Forests) and the GEF/FAO project  “Building global capacity to increase transparency in the forest sector” (CBIT-Forest) intend to raise awareness on the importance of open and transparent forest data in support to the Paris Agreement and the ETF, and directly support countries in their transition to the ETF. The relevant work of both projects will be highlighted alongside ETF-related actions from FAO Member countries.

Objectives

• Underscore the importance of forest data transparency for climate action with insights from countries and resource partners. 
• Learn how FAO’s Forestry Division is supporting the implementation of the enhanced transparency framework (ETF) under the Paris Agreement.
• Showcase how countries are enhancing their national forest monitoring systems (NFMS) and contributing with the implementation of the ETF.
• Launch the multilingual national forest inventory online facilitated course.