Intentional Governance of REDD+

1. A stakeholder-driven model for involvement in REDD+ Standards Setting Dr Federico López-Casero Forest Conservation Team, Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES) Dr Tek Maraseni Australian Centre for Sustainable Catchments University of Southern Queensland Intentional Governance of REDD+ Dr Tim Cadman UNU Institute for Ethics Governance and Law Griffith University

2. Governance scholarship Forthcoming April 2012: Climate Change and Global Policy Regimes: Towards Institutional Legitimacy “Cadman’s framework for evaluating the legitimacy of multilateral environmental agreements is one of the best I have seen; it is elegant and sophisticated without being overwhelmingly intricate. He should be commended for this latest effort.” — Peter J. Stoett, Concordia University, Canada Cadman, Timothy. 2011. Quality and legitimacy of global governance: case lessons from forestry. London and Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, International Political Economy Series http://www.palgrave.com/products/title.aspx?pid=395944 “This study makes a major contribution to governance theory” - Ben Cashore, Governing Through Markets

3. Poor Governance: Undermining Safeguards &Driving Deforestation & Forest Degradation • Poor accountability and transparency increase the risk of corruption, encouraging illegal/unsustainable logging • Where key interests are not represented in forestry decision-making: • information critical to sustainable resource management is lost • lack of ownership can reinforce existing unsustainable practices/behaviour Degraded forest, Makawanpur District, Nepal • Where measures for monitoring, reporting and verification of forest management are not implemented • solutions to deforestation and forest degradation are reduced 3

4. Why governance matters to REDD+ Tackling poor governance is an internationally recognised prerequisite for achieving investment in long-term forest management or any broader environment or development aims for the forest sector (UNFF, FAO, ITTO, World Bank, G8) • Cancun Agreements on REDD+ (Decision 1/CP.16) : The “safeguards [that] should be promoted and supported” include: “Transparent and effective national forest governance structures” (Appendix I, 2.(b)) • In May 2012, SBSTA considered the need for further guidance to “ensure transparency, consistency, comprehensivenessand effectiveness when informing on how all safeguards are addressed and respected and, if appropriate, to consider additional guidance” and report to COP18 4

5. Conflicting norms & rules in REDD+ governance • REDD+ agencies & partners have developed principles, criteria and country-level indicators for social & environmental standards,but definitions in use are inconsistentand incomplete • Implementationmay undermine safeguards to protect rights as well as project effectiveness • Contradictory governance definitions: • “accessibility, people’s participation, transparency, accountability, rule of law, predictability, justice and sustainability” (CCBA/CARE 2010, p. 9) • “equity, fairness, consensus, coordination, efficiency, transparency, accountability, effectiveness, responsiveness, participation, the rule of law, and many others” (UN-REDD 2012, Glossary, p. 9) • WEAKENED roles for rights/stakeholders • “Consultations should facilitate meaningful participation at all levels.” (FCPF 2009, 6 b, p. 2) • “‘Full and effective participation’ means meaningful influence of all relevant rights holders and stakeholders who want to be involved throughout the process” (CCBA/CARE 2010 (2.2. and footnote 26 1 p. 7) ➡ The difference between degrees of tokenism or citizen power (Arnstein 1969) 5

6. How to evaluate governance quality? Table 1: Best practice normative framework of principles, criteria and indicators (PC&I) for evaluating governance quality following Cadman (2011) and Lammerts van Bueren and Blom (1997) • 11 Indicators(Parameters) • 4 Criteria (categories): • Interest representation • Organisational responsibility • Decision making • Implementation • 2 Principles (values): • Meaningful participation • Productive deliberation Methods for monitoring and evaluation in the field creates Verifiers results in Quality-of-Governance STANDARDS for REDD+ verification, accreditation and Certification 6

7. Table 2: Comparative textual analysis of selected REDD policy documents against Table 1 and Arnstein’s Ladder of Citizen Participation (1969) 1. FCPF 2009 - Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF) Readiness MechanismNational Consultation and Participation for REDD May 6, 2009 2. SES 2010 - REDD+ Social & Environmental Standards Version 1 June 2010 3. FCPF 2011 – Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF) Readiness Fund Common Approach to Environmental and Social Safeguards for Multiple Delivery Partners 4. UN-REDD 2012 - UN-REDD Programme Social and Environmental Principles and Criteria

8. Fig.1: Trends in stakeholder perceptions of selected governance quality indicators: Northern and Southern countries, State and Non-state actors: Nov. ‘09 – Dec. 11 8

9. Nepal project • Process of developing voluntary national quality-of-governance standard in Nepal through multi-stage and multi-stakeholder process has been innovative: Stakeholders, NOT researchers/funders develop verifiers based on generic PC&I • Active participation and engagement of a diverse range of stakeholders demonstrates they saw the value of developing such a standard through a robust, participatory and transparent process • The intention is to provide a benchmark governance standard, against which REDD+ governance can be monitored, reported and verified via independent third party certification

10. Aid programmes • Community forest users • Dalit • Financial institutions • Forest-based industries • Government • Indigenous organisations • Madhesi • NGO • Women • Other Fig.1: Methodology for drafting and consulting a governance standard for REDD+ and the forest sector in Nepal Multi-stakeholder Multi-stage Online questionnaire survey(Preliminary list of verifiers) Key Informant interviews (Additional verifiers) Multi-stakeholder Forum Workshop(First preliminary draft standard and verifiers) Multi-level Field consultations :REDD+ pilot areas & controls (First preliminary draft of local level verifiers) 66 completed responses, 131 attempts, 300 invitees 50+ interviewees in Nepal and overseas 43 cross-sector participants 180+ national, sub-national & local verifiers National consultation Draft standard 300+ circulation ONGOING

11. Recommendations for COP 18 & Conclusions • Rather than make stake-/rights- holders the subject of governance (‘consultees’) it would be more appropriate for stake-/rights- holders to develop • Stakeholder-driven Quality-of-Governance standards for REDD+ at the national, sub-national and local levels • These can still follow international frameworks, but on-the-ground they would • Make REDD+ governance truly participatory • Increase accountability and transparency • Include all interests in decision-making • Take MRV beyond baselines for carbon accounting, etc. • “The MRV of governance and the governance of MRV” • Improvethe likelihood of effectiveness of REDD+ 11

12. Thank you lopezcasero@iges.or.jp Maraseni@usq.edu.aut.cadman@griffith.edu.au

13. ECA Presentations available at: www.ecosystemsclimate.org