Intentional Governance of REDD+
A stakeholder-driven model for involvement in
REDD+ Standards Setting
Dr Federico López-Casero
Forest Conservation Team,
Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES)
USQ
Dr Tek Maraseni
Australian Centre for Sustainable Catchments
University of Southern Queensland
TOOWOOMBA
Dr Tim Cadman
UNU Institute for Ethics Governance and Law
Griffith University
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
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 decisionmaking:
• 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
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, comprehensiveness and effectiveness when
informing on how all safeguards are addressed and respected and, if
appropriate, to consider additional guidance” and report to COP18
4
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 inconsistent and incomplete
• Implementation may 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
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)
Principle
Criterion
Indicator
Inclusiveness
Interest representation
“Meaningful participation”
Equality
Resources
Organisational responsibility
Accountability
Transparency
Democracy
“Productive deliberation”
Decision making
Agreement
Dispute settlement
Behaviour change
Implementation
Problem solving
Durability
Methods for monitoring and evaluation in the field creates Verifiers results in
Quality-of-Governance STANDARDS for
REDD+ verification, accreditation and Certification
6
Table 2: Comparative textual analysis of selected REDD policy documents against Table 1
and Arnstein’s Ladder of Citizen Participation (1969)
Level of
participation
Type of
participation
Extent of
participation
8
Degrees of
citizen power
6
CITIZEN
CONTROL
DELEGATED
POWER
PARTNERSHIP
5
PLACATION
Degrees of
tokenism
4
CONSULTATION
3
INFORMING
2
THERAPY
1
MANIPULATION
7
1. NCPR
(FCPF)
2009
47
2. SES
(CCBA/CARE)
2010
3. CAESS
FCPF
(2011)
43
4. SEPC
(UN-REDD)
2012
42
39
Nonparticipation
1. FCPF 2009 - Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF) Readiness Mechanism National 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
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
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
9
Fig.1: Methodology for drafting and consulting a governance standard for REDD+
and the forest sector in Nepal
Multi-stakeholder
Multi-level
Multi-stage
66 completed responses, 131 attempts, 300 invitees
50+ interviewees in Nepal and overseas
43 cross-sector participants
180+ national, sub-national
& local verifiers
300+ circulation
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Aid programmes
Community forest users
Dalit
Financial institutions
Forest-based industries
Government
Indigenous organisations
Madhesi
NGO
Women
Other
Online questionnaire survey
(Preliminary list of verifiers)
Key Informant interviews
(Additional verifiers)
Multi-stakeholder Forum Workshop
(First preliminary draft standard and verifiers)
Field consultations :REDD+ pilot areas & controls
(First preliminary draft of local level verifiers)
National consultation
Draft standard
ONGOING
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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-theground 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”
 Improve the likelihood of effectiveness of REDD+
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Thank you
lopezcasero@iges.or.jp
Maraseni@usq.edu.au
t.cadman@griffith.edu.au
ECA Presentations
available at:
www.ecosystemsclimate.org