Session 3: Drivers, processes and policy
assessments
Martin Herold and Niki de Sy
Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia
Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia
Ministry of Agriculture
Environmental Protection Authority
Workshop for developing a roadmap for an Ethiopian
national REDD+ MRV framework
Drivers of deforestation and forest
degradation
A synthesis report for REDD+ policymakers
Commissioned by United Kingdom Departments
for Energy and Climate Change (DECC) and
International development (DFID) and The
Government of Norway’s International Climate
and Forest initiative.
Drivers of deforestation and degradation
 Proximate/direct causes: human activities or immediate
actions that directly impact forest cover and loss of carbon
 Deforestation: commercial agriculture, subsistence
agriculture, mining, infrastructure and urban expansion
 Forest degradation: logging, fires, livestock grazing in
forest, fuelwood collection and charcoal production
 Underlying/indirect causes: complex interactions of
fundamental social, economic, political, cultural and
technological processes that are often distant from their area
of impact
 Important to address them separately and examine them
at various scales for specific analysis and intervention
strategies
Direct or proximate drivers
Indirect or underlying drivers
 Economic growth
 Population growth / Urban growth
 Demand for timber and agricultural products
 Weak forest sector governance and institutions,
conflicting policies beyond forest sector and illegal
activity
 Poverty and insecure tenure
Role of drivers in national forest
monitoring
Importance of monitoring drivers
Identifying forest change drivers (locally, nationally,
internationally) is needed to:
● help track their activities over time,
● attribute emissions to specific causes,
● design dedicated mitigation actions that address
them,
● assess the impact of mitigation actions,
● facilitate engagement with non-forest sectors
Analysing and assessing proximate drivers
 Linking forest (area) changes to specific activities and
follow-up land use is essential for assessing drivers
 Spatial context and location, and other features (e.g.
roads, settlements) can help in interpretation
 Remote sensing analysis
 Local and regional knowledge (experts and
communities), ground observations
 GHG emissions from drivers: commonly not available on
national level
 Type and drivers have great influence on net forest
carbon impacts – and the way these impacts can be
measured and monitored
Carbon stock changes due to different
deforestation and degradation processes
Drivers: REDD+ policy development
and implementation
Interventions at relevant scales and key
actors
Adequate approaches and information
Countries should:
 Consider and integrate of information beyond the forest
sector: track driver activity, social and environmental
safeguards, and evaluation of trade-offs and livelihood
implications
 Recognize linkages between REDD+ and emerging
agricultural mitigation and adaptation—orchestrated and
complementary funding streams to countries
 Established uniform criteria on land-use classifications +
capacities of sectoral and regional information systems
A summary for Ethiopia
Key Direct drivers (R-PP)
 Conversion of forests to agricultural land
The impact is set to increase, as agricultural land requirements
will increase by an estimated 19 MHa by 2030 in a ‘business as
usual‘ growth path, spurred by strong governmental support to
develop agriculture and sustained demographic growth of 2-3 %
per year.
 Unsustainable fuel wood consumption
As the evolution of fuel wood consumption is strongly correlated
to population growth, its impact on degradation is expected to
reach, in a ‘business as usual‘ scenario, 22Mt per year by 2030,
as the Ethiopian population reaches 130 Mln people.
 Other: logging, clearing to convert to pastureland,
and clearing to build infrastructures.
Underlying drivers (R-PP)

Deficiencies in the regulatory and institutional environment:
● Unclear user rights,
● low empowerment of local communities
● absence of benefit sharing mechanisms
 ‘open access’ mentality and conversion to agriculture

Inappropriate regulation, or the absence of means of implementation,
combined with the absence of a strong, dedicated forestry institution,
failed to protect forests.
● lack of resources (i.e. financial, human and institutional
capacity)
● inherent deficiency of the forest regulatory instrument
 resulted in widespread illegal/uncontrolled use of the forest
This, combined with irregularities and inconsistencies in the
implementation of bans on forest products, created a disincentive for
forest-dependent people to invest in forest management/protection
because of a lack of security over future returns.
Planned interventions
Current strategies aimed at addressing deforestation and
degradation in Ethiopia within the current legal and policy
framework can be divided into:
(1) Plantation forest of exotic species,
(2) Agroforestry,
(3) Area closures of deforested areas for natural forest
regeneration,
(4) Protected areas of natural forest, National Parks
(5) CDM project areas related to plantations or
reforestations,
Planned interventions (continued)
(6) Devolution of forest management through participatory
forest management (PFM),
(7) Traditional/customary forest management practices,
(8) REDD+ pilots
(9) National Bio fuel Strategy: national biogas program,
rural electrification [renewable energy], dissemination of
fuel efficient improved stoves
(10) Food Security Strategy
(11) Integration of REDD+ into budget, laws, policy,
strategy, program, plan and projects