A key contributor to climate change, species loss, and threat to the livelihoods of the 1.6 billion people who depend on forests for food and livelihoods: deforestation ranks among the great challenges of this century.

Since our inception in 2010, the EU REDD Facility has learnt that combining climate, aid and trade-related interventions has great potential to address drivers of deforestation. We’ve also found that protecting forests and incentivising sustainable land use are only possible if governments, private sectors, and civil societies of tropical forest regions partner to generate change.

Momentum for sustainable land use and supply chains 

As a Facility, we’re focused on finding opportunities for contributing to progress in climate change mitigation and sustainable land use and supply chains. There’s good momentum for us to build on.

Countries are starting to act on their commitments under the Paris Agreement on climate change. More companies are committing to eliminating deforestation from supply chains. And the EU has set out a new plan to protect and restore the world’s forests and is exploring options to strengthen implementation of its action plan on illegal logging.

What we’ll be blogging

I’m pleased to introduce this new EU REDD Facility blog, where our experts will share their thoughts about and experiences with working with our partners in tropical forest countries in Africa, Asia and South America on:

• Legality of forest conversion
• Sustainable land-use investment and management
• Transparency in forest-risk commodity supply chains

This will be a space for free thought, where we’ll push the boundaries of our institutional agenda. But always within sight will be our mission to support tropical forest countries find innovative approaches and solutions to their land-use governance and sustainable development goals. 

In all of our work and through the tools and approaches we develop, we promote dialogue among people with varied interests in forests – from policy-makers and business leaders to civil society and community representatives. This blog will complement and further that ongoing discourse. We hope it will also bring additional knowledge and understanding to policy-makers in Europe as they move ahead with new policies to promote sustainable land use and investment.

The challenges ahead can sometimes seem insurmountable. But with joint, creative action, we can affect real and lasting change. We look forward to sharing our ideas and collaborating with you to find creative solutions to the complex drivers of deforestation.