Kevin Conrad of Papua New Guinea and Federica Bietta of Italy – two bold MBA graduate students at Columbia University– took on a challenge to change the world for the better. Inspired by a call to action by Grand Chief Sir Michael Somare, Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea, Kevin and Federica posed themselves the question of how to conserve the planet’s rainforests and bring equity to people around the world.

Their thesis: make trees worth more alive than dead. After all, rainforests provide a natural service for free; they absorb carbon dioxide, the greenhouse gas primarily responsible for climate change, and stop its release into the atmosphere. Dr. Geoffrey Heal, an economics professor at Columbia University, had written about nature and its role in the marketplace. What if the world attributed a financial value to that natural service? The largest contributors to greenhouse gas emissions could then pay for this service provided by the rainforests in countries hardest hit by the effects of climate change, slowing the acceleration of climate change and global inequity.

Kevin and Federica dubbed their effort Reducing Emissions from Deforestation (RED).As with many paradigm-shifting ideas, people were initially skeptical. But Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz, an advisor, wasn’t! Neither was the government of Costa Rica, whose tropical forests represented 1% of the planet’s total. That December, after securing the formal support of Costa Rican government, the newfound Coalition travelled to the United Nations Climate Summit in Montreal, Canada, for the opportunity to be heard on a global stage.

At the Climate Summit, the Coalition introduced and championed a proposal for a results-based RED mechanism for consideration by the world. This was based on the idea of positive incentives for developing countries to retain their rainforests and seek payments for results of retaining their national rainforest reference levels’ to ‘for results measured against their national rainforest reference levels. This mechanism was tabled by the Coalition for Rainforest Nations, Papua New Guinea and Costa Rica. But industrialized, developing countries who had caused climate change by emitting greenhouse gases over previous decades fought against RED, as would have to reward those countries that hadn’t and whose rainforests absorbed carbon.

The effort to revalue rainforests came to a head in 2007 at the United Nations Climate Summit in Bali. There was a stalemate between developed and developing countries on agreeing to a global climate action plan–the predecessor of the Paris Agreement. In the final hours of the summit, the United States refused to agree to the plan. In a session with over 190 countries, CfRN’s Executive Director, Kevin Conrad, who was also acting as the Ambassador and Special Envoy on Climate Change for Papua New Guinea at the time and leading negotiations for rainforest nations, politely said:

In Copenhagen in 2009, the world finally seemed on a course to achieve a global climate agreement. Many heads of state flew to Denmark on the last days of the Climate Summit, including President Obama of the United States and Premier Wen Jiabo of China. Yet again, the world couldn’t agree fully on what to do about the climate emergency.

Even after the Cancun Summit, the developed countries dragged their feet on REDD+. Many groups found reasons why it wouldn’t work and kept blocking progress. Then, in December 2013, the Climate Summit in Warsaw, Poland produced seven decisions on REDD+, known jointly as the “Warsaw Framework on REDD-plus”. These decisions addressed results-based finance for the first time after years of discussion regarding national forest monitoring systems; information on safeguards; technical assessment of reference (emission) levels; modalities for measuring, reporting, and verifying (MRV); and information on addressing the drivers of deforestation and forest degradation. Eligibility for access to “results-based finance” was finally on the agenda and an overall framework for REDD+ implementation was completed, although many details still needed to be provided.

After over a decade of persistence, and with over 50 rainforest countries in support, the Coalition of Rainforest Nations finally succeeded in establishing REDD+ within a global climate agreement between the members of the United Nations. The remaining outstanding decisions on REDD+ were also completed at the Summit. These included decisions on reporting on the safeguards, non-market approaches, and non-carbon benefits; the rulebook on REDD+ was completed.

All countries were encouraged to implement and support REDD+ in Article 5 of the Paris Agreement. This was part of a broader article that specified that all countries should take action to protect and enhance their greenhouse gas sinks and reservoirs, not only the rainforests.

The 21st session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 21) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), held in Paris in December 2015, successfully concluded 10 years of negotiations on the new global climate regime.

After many years of intense negotiations that started in Montreal at COP11 in 2004, all Parties adopted the Paris Agreement, which is now the foundation of the global fight against the climate emergency. For the Coalition and REDD+ the next advocacy challenge would be Article 6 of the Paris Agreement.

Paris Agreement goes into effect

One year after COP26 Glasgow, where mention of the Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) framework was controversially removed from the implementation article of the Paris Agreement (Article 6), rainforest nations successfully negotiated REDD+ back into the Sharm-El Sheikh Implementation Plan at COP27. In thrilling last-minute negotiations, CfRN re-affirmed the REDD+ framework as the global initiative for slowing, stopping, and reversing deforestation under the Paris Agreement. The text also underscored the role of private finance in supporting developing country efforts. In the COP27 Sharm El-Sheikh Implementation Plan, REDD+ was restated in section XVI on Forests, paragraph 47:

…Recalls that, in the context of the provision of adequate and predictable support to developing country Parties, Parties should collectively aim to slow, halt and reverse forest cover and carbon loss, in accordance with national circumstances, consistently with the ultimate objective of the Convention, as stated in its article 2; (footnote 30: Decisions 1/CP.16 and 9/CP.19.)..

Private sector finance has always been integral to the success of UNFCCC REDD+. There has never been a COP decision that ruled REDD+ out of the carbon markets. In Egypt, CfRN re-iterated this position with the inclusion of Footnote 30 which refers to previously recognized COP decisions, 1/CP.16, and 9/CP.19 that encourage private sector finance for developing countries in return for accomplished emissions reductions under the REDD+ framework.