From 26 to 29 April 2016, FAO, along with several partners, organized the “Drylands & Forest and Landscape Restoration (FLR) Monitoring Week” at FAO Headquarters in Rome (Italy). This event brought together more than seventy experts from a wide variety of countries and organizations, including experts from Great Green Wall countries in Africa. Aimed at catalyzing efforts for monitoring FLR, it benefited from the momentum created by the Drylands Monitoring Week organized in 2015 by FAO, WRI and the Global Environment Facility (GEF) with support from the European Union/African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States (ACP). 

The “Drylands & Forest and Landscape Restoration (FLR) Monitoring Week” gave the opportunity to participants to share updates on progress made in the implementation of the Rome Promise; review needs and opportunities for FLR monitoring; take stock of available tools and approaches and share examples of their application; and to identify gaps and priority actions to move forward. These priority actions and recommendations from participants have been captured in the key outcomes of the event “Drylands & Forest and Landscape Restoration (FLR) Monitoring Week”: 

1. Drylands-focused outcomes: A revised roadmap for the Rome Promise; a proposal for a COFO working group on Dryland forests and Agrosilvopastoral systems; and
2. A roadmap to support and align FLR monitoring efforts globally: the Collaborative Roadmap for FLR Monitoring.  

Participants acknowledged the need for monitoring in order to report to international, regional and national commitments (Bonn Challenge, Aichi Target 15, LDN, SDGs, AFR100, Initiative 20x20...), and to investors, politicians and citizens as well. They recognized the importance of monitoring for other purposes such as managing implementation and giving feedback to adjust activities, providing evidence on achievements and impacts, communicating on results and securing FLR investors. Although some conditions for successful FLR monitoring are already in place (e.g. technological revolution, methodologies and tools, funding for assessment and monitoring), there are still challenges that need to be tackled such as improving the coordination amongst projects and stakeholders, meeting the needs of different audiences at different scales, or implementing sustainable processes of assessment, monitoring and evaluation. These challenges – and the need for simple, low-cost and sustainable FLR monitoring - are particularly relevant at country-level (from national to local community level). Consequently, much of the focus during the monitoring week was on how to provide better support to countries for FRL monitoring. 

Case studies focused on the challenges in monitoring socio-economic aspects, on the need of linking monitoring at national and local levels, and of striving for sustainability. It was also pointed out that a participatory approach including all relevant groups should be used to ensure that the ownership of the process is transferred to the appropriate stakeholders and that monitoring systems meet the true needs and capacities of stakeholders to effectively carry out effective and relevant monitoring. The working group discussions included the environmental, socioeconomic and enabling environment aspects of monitoring. 

Building on these facts, participants jointly designed a collaborative roadmap for FLR monitoring. This roadmap aspires to encourage and support countries and in-country actors, and other relevant partners in monitoring FLR at all scales, by helping organizations to collaborate and coordinate their individual actions.

Participants agreed that the roadmap should build on existing tools, identify connections across them and make them accessible to all, develop capacities and foster knowledge exchange and communication through appropriate information systems. Five priority activity streams for joint implementation were identified: 

1. Develop and refine guidance documents on the design, establishment and operation of FLR monitoring systems, aligned with existing processes and fostering cross-sectoral coordination;
2. Develop and maintain an interactive FLR knowledge platform including: 

• An on-line library (tool box) of monitoring resources (candidate indicators and tools, guidance materials);
• Capacity building materials (e-learning modules…);

1. Form and test evolving technical alliances, mechanisms and/or networks to support effective FLR processes (including monitoring) in selected countries and regions;
2. Create (or as appropriate, build on existing) and facilitate a community of learning, supported, amongst other things by knowledge sharing events (incl. peer to peer);
3. Form an innovation hub to support other activity streams, harnessing contributions from the science, technology and innovation communities. This activity stream could be shared with the roadmap supporting the “Rome Promise on Monitoring and Assessment of Drylands for Sustainable Management and Restoration”.

The collaborative roadmap on FLR monitoring will be implemented by an open coalition of partners, with a core group composed by FAO, IUCN, WRI, the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) Secretariat and UNEP, and will contribute to the Global Partnership on Forest and Landscape Restoration (GPFLR) and to the Bonn Challenge.

For further information and the detailed report on the week, including the complete roadmap, please refer to the following webpage: "Drylands and Forest and landscape restoration monitoring week 2016". To join the collaborative roadmap on FLR monitoring and be part of one or several of the activity streams please contact the FLRM team at: [email protected].

Faustine Zoveda and Carolina Gallo