Collaborative Partnership on Forests Round Table: Accelerating collaborative actions towards achieving the Global Forest Goals (UNFF21 Side Event)

Good afternoon, colleague.
Distinguished delegates, ladies and gentlemen, a warm welcome to this side event of the Collaborative Partnership on Forest, CPF roundtable, accelerating collaborative actions toward achieving the global forest goals.
It is my pleasure to moderate this important discussion.
Today's event provides an opportunity for dialogue between members and the UN Forum on forests and members of the CPF on how collaborative action can help accelerate progress toward the global forest goals with a particular focus on global forest goal one, reversing loss and degradation.
Goal three, on increasing area of protected forest and proportion of forest product from sustainably managed forests.
And goal five on promoting governance framework for sustainable forest management.
As we look towards 2030, stronger support for implementation is essential, particularly in responding to the capacity, technology, and financing needs of developing countries.
We will therefore hear from member states on emerging priorities and support needs and from CPF members on concrete actions and commitment that can advance to help countries out and reverse deforestation, restore degradation degraded forest landscape, and sustainably manage forest.
It is my pleasure to invite ADG Wu Jinh to deliver his opening remark.
Thank you.
Thank you, Julie.
Distinguished delegates, dear colleagues.
Welcome to the study event of the CPF.
Actually, CPF has been a vehicle within the international arrangement of forests to accelerate progress towards the global forest goals through collaboration and action.
Actually, the mandate of CPF is to support the process of UN through joint programming.
There has been several recent important initiatives in the International forest related fora in the last year.
This include the UN F C Cp 30 presidency initiatives, especially the presidency roadmap for holding and reversing the deforestation forest degradation by 2030 and the other Cp 30 initiatives like T F, Lac Ta and Productive forests.
We have been engaging in a number of the presidency initiatives.
And also the review of the CBD expanded programs of work on forest biological diversity, and the Country and Organizational Led Initiative, on advancing sustainable forest based by economy approaches.
This and other developments show a clear and growing convergence around the central role of forests in addressing interconnected global challenges.
In bringing together 16 international organizations, institutions, and Secretariat, the CPF is an integral part of the evolving landscape by helping to connect dots and support coherent, coordinated action to support the UNA process.
So in the coming days, UNFF member states will be negotiating a resolution for UNFF 21, and this will shape how the CPF focuses efforts, strengthen cooperation, and deliver support where it is most needed.
I think one of the five major pillars of the international rainbow forests.
It's a critical time for CPF to receive further guidance from member states of the UNFF and progress depends on national leadership, but the CPF has an important supportive role.
We help connect the dots across mandates, reduce fragmentation, make our say mandate supplementary and translate shared ambitions into practical cooperation.
The CPF is also a dependable partner, listening carefully, responding quickly, and aligning ourselves or our joint work with the priorities of member states.
Yesterday at our CPF members meeting, we talked about the alignment of CPF priorities, our work plans with the concerns and priorities and interests of members.
Over the past years, CPF continued to strengthen the way we work through joint initiatives and other collaborative actions, and importantly, through a more streamlined, targeted, and result oriented approach set out in the recent finalized CPF work plan for 2025 and 28.
So we are all adapting to an evolving global landscape, new risks on the horizon, accelerating climate impact and persistent pressure on forest demands integrated solutions that deliver across climate, biodiversity, live levels, and sustainable development.
So the CPF is no exception.
Today's event is designed to be interactive and to enable feedback from you that will help guide the work of CPF.
It has two purposes to update On CPF collaboration in support of progress towards global forest goals, especially 135, and to identify the priority needs and constraints of member states to ensure that CPF support is fully aligned to ensure that CPF support is fully aligned and effective.
I encourage you to be frank and forward looking in your interventions.
The CPF stands ready to leverage its convening power and comparative advantages.
We are a dynamic partnership, strategic, adaptive, forward looking, and focused on results.
So thank you in advance for your guidance, which will help sharpen CPF support as you shape the UNFF 21st outcomes and path ahead.
Thank you.
Thank you very much, chair of the CPF for setting so nicely the stage for our discussions.
Thank you for your inspiring opening remark that highlights the importance of the CPF, one of the five components of the international arrangement on forests.
The guidance from member states is needed.
Indeed, as we enter the final stretch to 2030 when the final review of the IAF is due.
I now have the pleasure of introducing the distinguished speakers from member states.
Mr.
Gu, Batmanan Director General Forest Service of Brazil, Mr.
Hu Yang Hui, Executive Director General of the International Cooperation Center, National Forestry and Grassland Administration of China.
Mr.
George Tas, Forest Development Secretary of the Ministry of Environment, Climate Change and Forestry of Kenya.
Miss Keith Anderson, Senior Advisor for International Forest Policy, Federal Office for the Environment, Switzerland.
We invite each speaker to share views and insights in response to the following guiding questions.
What emerging issues, trend, or risk on the forest horizon does your country see as critical for accelerating progress toward Global Forest goal one, three, and five, and how can CPF align its work plan and support to address these effectively? The second guiding question before I come back again on the first one.
Yeah.
Okay.
What concrete steps is your country taking to enhance collaboration with the CPF to respond to these emerging priorities, and what specific support from CPF will most help in advancing national and global forest objectives? Finally, what innovative approaches, tools, or partnerships should CPF adopt to accelerate progress toward the implementation of the UN strategic plan for forests? I now invite the member speakers to share their reflection.
In the interest of time, I kindly ask each speaker to keep the remark to approximately 5 minutes.
I would like to invite Mr.
Gutmanan Mr.
Gu, you have the floor.
Thank you, Madame Jillit.
Can you hear me? Again, it's a pleasure to be here CPF.
This is a family.
As you know, we used to be sitting on the other side.
It's a musical chairs.
We change chairs, but we don't change the agenda.
That's a good thing, but it's also bad because that means that we are always this group.
We don't have many new people coming in.
We just keep changing chairs.
But it's a pleasure to be here.
I very much like the 2017230 strategic plan.
Before I go on, I also want to thank the CPF for the support they gave us to organize the Forest Pavilion at the CP 30, the different members of the CPF help us.
I think it was very important that we had a forest Pavilion in the CP and I hope that becomes a tradition even when it's not in Brazil.
That from now on, we should have one.
I'm not going to spend my time explaining how important that was, but it was very important to have a place where we could have forests discussing different aspects.
We were basically overbooked how many people we got there.
Thank you for your support that Canada Brazil co organized this with the great support from the secretary here.
On the CPF, we are very thankful for everything you're doing.
But here's the thing.
If we keep doing what we have done, we're going to keep having the same result we always had.
We have to start thinking differently and we need to disrupt ourselves.
I think we have to think bigger, more challenging with different things, not necessarily just scale up the things we're doing.
There are two main issues that we need to achieve the goals.
One is knowledge and the second one is money.
Knowledge, I think that it is time to recognize that most of our countries already have a good deal of knowledge.
We have to start promoting better south south cooperation, better documentation, better coding of the things that the countries already do and that we can benefit from each other, so increase efficiency.
But the second part is money.
I know you don't have money.
We know that money is in short supply on the people around this room.
But that's what I think we have to be creative.
When Brazil came up with a TFFF three years ago, nobody said was possible.
We already got $6.7 billion worth of pledges, including $1 billion from Brazil.
So I'm not saying this is the silver bullet is going to solve all the problems, but we have to come with something that is disruptive, is different, is big and ambitious and TFFF is just an example.
Where I think the problem is and where I urge the CPF members to think about it is that we are not promoting forests very well.
We are promoting forests for ourselves.
We're not promoting forests for the world, for those that depend on the forest.
We talk about the forests as importance for us, but I think we have to start and I beg you to start saying how forest is important for agriculture? How forest is important for water.
Those things if World Bank writes a report about this and says it's going to lose X amount of billion dollars a year like Martin just did yesterday, $81 billion the cost, why is not accounted for? It's not accounted for because forest is not seen as an asset.
So you're losing $81 billion of something that is not an asset is not accounted for.
So we need you to please, with us, to please start making the case that the forest is not only important for the forest itself, but is important for food systems, for water systems, for health, because that will increase the interest of private sector and public sector in investing in forests, investing in protection, investing in conservation, because benefits agriculture, because it benefits, water supply.
I think that's one very important point that I think you can all can do and help us because If we say it's going to be self serving, if you say it with your organizations, it will carry a different weight.
Let's be practical.
Not everything is priced in the market.
So let's talk about the things that the market sees.
Decreasing productivity agriculture is something that people see.
Increase of cost of water because of water shortage is something they see.
I'm giving you two examples which I think is very important for us to consider going forward.
The second part of it is what we are trying to do in our roadmap in Brazil.
Help us do the roadmap.
In order to do that, we have to get out of the room that we are here and start talking about the other aspects because forest is a land use type.
So we cannot have forests if we also not discuss about sustainable agriculture.
Because without sustainable agriculture, people are going to keep chopping down forest to plant.
The roadmap as we did in Brazil, is a whole of the government approach.
We should lead, but we should not do it alone.
I think that's another thing that I hope that be disrupted.
Think differently that how we can use we have here the Minister of Agriculture Development of Brazil here is going to present tomorrow small farmers.
How we can have these guys work with us.
They are not against us.
Let's make them work with us on agriculture on mining on other topics and make a whole of a government plan, and then we achieve the goals at the end of the day that deforestation prevented the deforestation that the forest is standing.
Not only the trees and the wood, but everything else that it stands for it.
Those are my main messages.
Three.
One is knowledge, but promotes self south.
Second, let's be disruptive, we think something ambitious like the FFF or others where we finance.
But in order to do that, Let's show what the forest is.
It's not only ODS 15, is many all the other ODS and why this is important economically.
Then third, let's think about the whole of the government.
Forest is an anchor, we are the anchor, but we are anchor of a boat.
We are not anchor alone.
Thank you.
Thank you very much, Go.
I will not repeat what you have summarized very nicely.
I will just maybe emphasize the need for cross sectoral coordination because this is something that we are struggling in addressing, you know, and while focusing on forest management.
Okay.
It is now my pleasure to invite Mr.
Hu Yang Hi.
Mr.
Hu, you have the floor.
Thank you so much, Julie, for inviting me to attend this important side event.
In order to stick to your homework, the assignment you made, first of all, I would like to mention something about the achievements.
When we talk about the forestry in my country, actually, the forestry developed quite well in my country.
One fact is that in the past 40 years, we enjoyed constant increase both in for coverage and stock volume.
These achievements due to many support.
Number one is the strong political will from our top government.
For example, our top leaders, the president, premier, West premier participated tree planting every year.
These send a strong signal to the general public, we care forest, we care the nature conservation.
However, there are still challenges in the forestry sector that may have impact on the progress towards global forestry goals.
Here, I would like to mention two areas that may require support or assistance from CVF or from other organizations.
Number one is the forestry forestry quality in my country.
Forests are different in different parts of the world in terms of function, in terms of their biodiversity.
In average per capita per hectare volume in the country, the forest is 95 cubic meters, which is lower than the world average, which is 152 cubic meters, according to Frear 2035 report.
These low stocking model, we can call them, poor quality forest has capacity for carbon segregation and has ability to provide timber products.
This is the current obstacles or risks that we have to face in our next five years plan, blue plan, particularly for forest management.
We prefer to increase to improve the forestry quality rather than expanding the forest areas because we need quality forest rather than less approve forest.
This is the number one issue that we may need assistance from CBI or other organizations.
The second issue is for diseases.
As we know, forest suffers from many different kinds of diseases.
In my country, the most important or dangerous species is called pinewood nematode, which is quite common in pine trees.
For example, in 2025, we have more than 900,000 hectares of pine forest suffered from these diseases, resulting in 4 million tree died.
This is an obvious problem that may impact on the increase of the forest area.
Finally, for the innovative collaboration, I can give you an example how we work with the World Bank.
In the beginning of this year, our government and the World Bank jointly launched China World Bank Group Global Center for Ecological Systems and Transition.
The shortening is CWDC.
This center has a function to serve as a knowledge hub.
We have already organized several activities to share our experiences and at the same time to learn from other counterparts.
I think this center will play more important role in the near future in terms of improving forestry quality and forestry management.
Thank you so much.
Thank you very much, Mr.
Wu, for really sharing the Chinese example, you know, in terms of the foundation that are already in place, the policies, the partnerships, and the growing political will.
And thank you also for highlighting the challenges you are facing.
I think the CPF members are in the room.
They will tell you how they can support in that if they are not already doing that.
So be a bit patient when we give them the floor, we will hear from them what they can do.
I now turn to Mr.
George Teres.
You have the floor, Mr.
Terres So thank you very much Chair.
Let me also record Kenya's appreciation for the invitation that has been extended to us to participate in this good meeting.
I say good in the sense that when I look at the questions that are before me, contextualizing that against what we've been able to do in Kenya.
I would want to say that there are lots that we've been able to do.
But of course, the journey is still not yet fully completed.
I've listened to my two colleagues from both Brazil and China and I see there is a commonality in terms of the challenges they are facing and probably the solutions they have already brought forth.
One fact that I also want to mention is that Kenya as a country is a low forest cover country that currently has a tree cover of 12.13% and a forest cover of 8.83%.
That in our own context, is a feat that we've been able to achieve despite quite a number of obstacles that we have to address, and I think quite a number of them have already been mentioned that when we talk of forests to the experts and the leaders in the forest sector, sometimes we miss the critical ingredients of what is required either to increase or to address the negative impacts that these forest resources are facing.
One fact for Kenya, the land will never increase.
But the population will always increase and the needs of the Kenyans will always be on an upper trajectory.
Therefore, when you go to a room to discuss issues and the challenges that are facing Kenya, most likely the forestry agenda would be number ten in what needs to be sorted out.
I believe that could also be very true across many other countries.
Therefore, we have to be innovative on how do we make forestry a topical agenda to the policymakers, to the person who puts the money where it is required because we've done many strategies.
We've clearly articulated what we need to do.
But like most other countries, those documents sometimes end up being purpose.
They end up being dreams that may not be realized.
The biggest challenge that I would want to place before CPF is how do we make these grants plans that we all have to ensure that we have reversal in the forest loss? What is that paradigship that we need to see for that to happen? Number one, my colleagues from Brazil already mentioned we need the money.
Minus the money, sometimes it gets a little bit difficult.
However, in Kenya, it may not be that sad.
There is something that we are trying to do.
Once secret we discovered, we have to make forestry a competitive option for that landowner.
That forestry can mean something on a personal level, and that's why we have strategies that are aiming to commercialize forestry so that when an household is thinking of which pathways they need to use to advance their life, forestry is one of them.
The plans are already there.
Secondly, which is also another critical lesson we've learned, is that sometimes if you don't shout about yourself, nobody would know about that.
Communication and communicating in a language that people understand.
What do forestry mean to Kenya? Sometimes we know and earlier we had a very good discussion with colleagues from FFO, the chair himself.
We were saying from where I'm sitated, forestry is the biggest contributor to food security in Canada.
But how often do that come in when the food security matter is being discussed.
It's nowhere.
You would see investment in how do we subsidize the fertilizer? How do we improve the M pm so that we have high productivity.
Forestry is rarely part of the equation, but the truth is, they would stabilize the climate so that our food is able to be produced.
They would even provide some food components.
We need, and I think it's also very important that communication is key and communicating in a way that is also very granular.
As a country, we've started a journey to revalue our forests so that when we talk of what it means to the economy, we have a number.
That speaks that can be able to basically communicate.
And and overally, I think the other which is also very important is when I scan to my front I see organizations starting from the old bank all the way to CBD.
But in one way or the other, we're engaging, working in the same space.
But sometimes they are rarely converging.
You would advance it's UNFCC agenda.
We are promoting our forests so that it works for climate.
Then the next thing we would be doing another one for sites.
So that lower level, then it gets confusing.
We have to find ways of breaking those silos so that when we took over forests, we took over forest that is delivering the agenda of all of us in almost a singular way, which I think is a very important factor.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr.
Terres for your remarks.
First of all, I would like really on behalf of the UNF Secretariat, to really extend our gratitude for Kenya.
I think Kenya was among the first countries who really submitted the report, the voluntary national reports, and it was the quality was really good.
And when I see it, I could really notice the progress Kenya made because some years before, Kenya was struggling assessing even the forest cover because of the fragmentation.
Thank you very much.
The challenges you raise here in my point of view, those challenges challenges that can be addressed by your country.
Communication, you have to communicate.
There's nothing.
I don't know what CPF can do to help you to say to promote what you do unless maybe you need some digital engagement, but I know that Kenya is very strong on that.
About also the competition among the agencies.
Again, it is the country who can really help them really to come together based on your need.
Everything is really in your hand, but keep in reaching out and let them know what you need.
I think you are in good hand and you can resolve all the issues that you raise here.
Yeah.
Thank you.
Anderson.
Mr.
Anderson, you have the floor.
Thank you and good afternoon.
For Switzerland as temperate forest and mountainous country, of course, for us, forest risk and forest disturbance, degradation and restoration are our central topics and we're urgently applying measures and improving our adaptive management regimes for Swiss forests as well as the rest of Central Europe and the rest of Europe and the Caucuses in Central Asia, we're heavily engaged, whether through the regional processes, the European Forestry Commission, COFO at the global level, And also, maybe I could mention one voluntary contribution that we made that might be relevant to all of the organizations here that we report to separately mostly.
And this is Agile Digital reporting.
We recently made a contribution to FAO, to the FRA, to machine to machine communication, to make agile the reporting on forests and on related topics because we think we have to make the evolution from a sending by email our Excel sheets to the machines being able to access information and also making it more robust, also the analysis.
Maybe an example of Swiss engagement with the CPF, I can give a very recent one that started about ten years ago and it was also mentioned by my colleague from Kenya on food security.
Forest for Food Security and nutrition, it's an important year now because after that first publication ten years ago, I think it's really come to an evolution where we see also our concerns for Switzerland for are not so important for food production itself.
I won't say that to the hunters and to the gatherers, but they actually in a mosaic landscape, they enable more agricultural production.
With exactly what Brazil mentioned of how forests are important for agriculture, water, health, ecosystems, and people in a mosaic landscape, in an intensively populated area such as Central Europe.
They're absolutely essential and we see that reflected in the paper that's being launched that we helped to review in COFO, it will be launched.
We also hope there will be a global activity conference.
We think it can stand alone.
It's an example of intersectoral interinstitutional because CFR and ECRF are together with FAO on it.
We see it as a very good example of CPF engagement and Switzerland is very pleased with the results of that.
Coming to the third question on innovation, I think we should step back a bit and look at the big picture and what is the CPF? What has it been all these years designed to do? It serves the international arrangement on forest.
It serves the UNFF.
It implements the decisions we take here as well as the decisions of many other processes.
So it's about coordination, cooperation, prioritization, and often we only see the individual organizations.
So we have several maybe several innovative ideas that we've been working on, and one would be a rotating chairmanship to allow some of the other organizations also to headline and to be in the focus of different types of priorities.
So it could be a rotating chairmanship or a rotating Secretariat.
And this would allow for more competition, which sometimes is healthy between the agencies.
It could allow for more decentralization.
Um, and it incentivizes more leadership from all of its members.
Because we work with all of the organizations and their excellence is just it's hard to say how we could make the CPF more dynamic and more powerful.
The second idea that we have is the CPF also should be closer to UNFF.
We think that there should be maybe a coordination or liaison person.
Perhaps by FAO, you could have someone in the UNFF Secretariat that's actually directly supporting the Secretariat instead of maybe duplicating the work.
And so this would also help the director of UNFF.
They would help with the global Forest goals to be more directly and focused by all of the organizations.
And we think FAO could really support UNFF in this way.
Finally, the last point is that we see the CPF could be more participatory, inclusive, transparent, efficient.
Because after all of these years, we sometimes have a problem saying, What is exactly the CPF? Because we see the strengths of the different organizations in different initiatives.
So we think it would be maybe healthy for the organizations themselves, for also the donors, the countries to evaluate the CPF occasionally.
Um, this might be part of the UNFF review, final review that this evaluation could lead to an improvement in the dynamic of the CPF.
So it's just some innovative ideas to throw out to you.
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much, miss Anderson, for your remarks and more importantly, your recommendation, which are here well noted by all CPF members and which will be maybe taken forward in the most appropriate time.
Now, to turn to the CPF representative, I have summarized here some of the issues raised, including promoting knowledge, especially south Su cooperation, innovative financing, promoting the multiple benefits of forests to forest dependent community, and while promoting those benefits, it is crucial to address the key drivers of deforestation, promoting the whole of government approach and cross sectoral interinstitutional approach and how to address forest diseases, how can the CPF help to address forest diseases in terms of innovation, coordination, cooperation, prioritization, and the list of the recommendation made by Mr.
Anderson.
So I now turn to the heads of representative of CPF member organization.
We invite you to respond to the reflection shared by member state and to address the following guiding questions.
What concrete joint action and commitment in your organization advancing to respond to member state needs and deliver measurable progress on GG one, three, and five second question, what is one collaboration gap the CPF can close and what practical step will your organization take to address it? The next 12 months.
I'm pleased to introduce the distinguished head of the representative of CPF member organization, including miss Astrid Schumacher, Executive Secretary of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity.
Miss Yvonne Higuero, Secretary-General of the Convention on International Trade and Endangered Species of Wild fauna and flora Societs.
Mr.
Claude Gascon, CEO and Chairperson of Global Environment Facility, miss MalgoZata Busco Briggs.
So, if I pronounce it.
Secretary of Committee of Forestry and Senior Forestry Officer of Food, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN.
Miss Sam Satkuu, Executive Director of International Tropical Timber Organization, Mr.
Stan Kumar, Global Head on Forest and Grassland at the International Union for Conservation of Nature, miss Daniella Kleinschmidt, President of the International Union of Forest Research Organization.
Mr.
Sasha Alexander, policy Officer at the Secretariat of the UN Convention to combat Desertification.
Miss Casey flying Director of Planets at the UN Development Program, and miss Wang.
I'm afraid I will not pronounce correctly.
So, miss Wang, Director of Transparency Division at the Secretariat of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.
And Mr.
Jen Christophe Lfuvre, Senior Forest Specialist at the World Bank.
I kindly ask each speaker to keep the intervention focused and action oriented so that we can hear from all CPF members and leave time for discussion from the floor.
I now would like to open the floor, to give the floor to CPF members.
Miss Asd have the floor.
Thank you.
Thank you.
It's a bit of a challenge the time and the number of speakers, so that may be super short and kick this off.
As CBD Secretariat, we're proud members of the partnership.
I think what the partnership does is address the challenges set out by the first four speakers we had.
From the CBD Secretary's perspective, first of all, we have the Coming global biodiversity Framework.
Forests are essential for us to achieve the MGBF targets, but the other way is true as well.
For forests, you need to have this much broader approach and I want to speak specifically to what we heard from Brazil.
Forests have this multi functionality, so you cannot address forest issues just with the forest lands.
You have to look at agriculture, you have to look at other production sectors, and you always have to look at finance.
Now addressing forests within the KMGBF allows us to have this broader perspective and that's why it is so important for us to work together with other like minded partners in this partnership so that we're not duplicating efforts because that's what somebody else has said, there is a shortage of money and we need to make sure that we're not competing with each other but building on each other's efforts.
I just want to give a couple of examples and I shut up and hand over to my neighbor how we're doing that concretely in the partnership.
We are leading the biodiversity mainstreaming in forestry that speaks directly to forest goals one, three, and five.
As a result, we have produced very specific technical guidance for parties how to integrate global forest goals into the national biodiversity strategies.
Why does that matter? Because these strategies are key implementing instruments of the KMG GIF with their own capacity of attracting funding.
There are a whole range of other knowledge productles which we can happily share our intervention so you can read them afterwards.
Last point I want to make, we have an important COP coming forward in five months where we take stock of where we are and there we will see where we're lagging behind.
I think we will see that forests will need more attention and that will bring us back to the Global Forest Partnership so we can leverage everybody's contribution and we want to make sure that forests have a very high profile at our COP.
Thanks.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
You don't have money to give countries, right? But how do you help them to mobilize money? Everybody else, we would like to have money, and I think like everybody else, I think we understand that if you're competing for resources, we're not going to be successful and hence, it is important that we come forward with joint initiatives and joint knowledge products for which we seek joint funding.
Thank you very much, miss Yvonne.
Thank you.
I'm going to try to be as brief as my neighbor and also because in plenary, we were able to make an intervention and basically talking about how sites contributes to global goals one, three, and five.
I see the challenges that you have brought up and I think that we can address those working as CPF and this is one of the reasons why we are very happy to be one of the newer partners of the CPF.
And if you think about what sites brings, where we have this legal framework that provides to make sure that the trade in these sites listed species is sustainable, that it is legal, that it is traceable.
This is how we are helping with maintaining forest cover.
This is how we're making sure that these species of trees that are highly valuable in many cases, in most cases, do not disappear from the wild.
So using these types of tools that we have, the sustainable to look at sustainability through non detriment findings or sustainability assessment, to be able to make sure that the trade is legal by using legal acquisition findings, We have a number of tools that are being used as compliance mechanisms under the Convention.
For example, all the enforcement work that we do.
We have something called Article 13 where there can be trade suspensions.
At least early on, there can be recommendations from parties to say how to improve the trade, to make sure that it is sustainable and legal, but there can be trade suspensions as well in those products or in those specimens, in the trees themselves to be able to make sure that they are not at risk of being lost from the wild.
All of these tools and here I share about using these types of tools that are right now used for sites.
If we talk about sustainability, why are we waiting until we have a worry and a concern about the sustainable trade? Shouldn't we be using these tools already in advance to make sure that the trade is sustainable in whatever species it may be? We have an opportunity to share those tools here, for example, the non detrimental findings for the sustainability and also the legal acquisition findings that can be used for any type of species.
This opportunity here within the CPF to be able to share those knowledge products is to me very important.
I think another aspect that is very important.
For example, with the enforcement that we do, is that we bring authorities together.
I think with the work that we do, we can bring the management authorities together with the forest authorities and have that discussion at the national level that we are talking about with that cross sectoral cooperation.
This is something else that we can offer.
Finally, with the project that we have on sites listed species that we can also bring, as you say, something that we can promise in the next few months is that we are bringing all of the leverage and all of the information and knowledge that the partners in the CPF have into those projects so that we can work on them together and take advantage of that knowledge that you all have.
Thank you.
I wish I could have the opportunity to see when Yvonne is as brief as her neighbor.
I'm Latina.
We are running out of the time, I'm told and maybe I will have to leave because they need me in the plenary.
So let us really be brief and I'm afraid I'm looking at my sister.
The executive director of ITTU.
I'm afraid I will, it's not you.
It's Claude.
No, I don't want you to be angry with me when I, you have the floor.
Thank you.
Thank you, Chair.
1 minute.
Thanks to the member countries for framing the discussion so clearly.
I can be very short just by saying that we do have money for countries.
Exactly.
Yes, we know that.
Yes.
As you all know, forests are central to the work of the JeF because they span across the different focal areas from biodiversity, land degradation, climate, and livelihoods.
In the past four years in F eight, we've been able to advance a lot of the global forest goals and priority number one, three, and five by advancing a lot of avoided deforestation through our critical forest biomes, as well as investing in over 110 countries that spans 95 million hectars in that area.
In terms of I'm sorry, protection, again, we've been very successful and just in the past four years, over 4.5 million hectares have come under new protection measures, and this is something that's critical.
Lastly, on governance, we incorporate a lot of policy, capacity building, and institutional building for land tenure, security, and the inclusion of indigenous peoples and local communities in all of the work.
This is about the real aspect of governance and sustainability of these outcomes.
Just say that in G nine, which will start July 1st, there will be a new pot of money for countries to continue this work.
We will continue with the critical forest biomes very significantly.
Let me just before closing, mention one new collaboration because you've asked about this where there were gaps.
We conversed as we were getting into the G nine negotiations over the past year and a half, which concluded last month, where we discussed with a T F team, how can we actually work together? One aspect that was missing in the T F was resources to be able to get countries ready for accessing T F money.
We included in the Je nine program the provision for countries to access JeF resources for a readiness program that would then allow them to be competitive on getting Triple F money.
Again, this is a way that the different pots of money can work very complimentary to each other.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
It's a great pleasure to be here.
It's an honor to be here to hear from the member states and to hear also from colleagues from the CPF family.
Let me just be extremely brief.
I just have four short points.
First, thank you for the guidance from the member states.
I think in response, we need to have more coordinated and more efficient country guided coordination and collaboration.
We as a CPF chair, we are committed and my boss is here, who is the chair of the CPF, very committed to continue this more efficient and more country driven collaboration while seeking innovative ways to do more with less.
I wanted to say that we don't have money as we discussed before, but now we know we have money, but I think it's still true to say that we need to do more with less nowadays.
Second, on the issue of knowledge products and knowledge generation, I think science, data, and innovation for informed decisions.
This is our key point.
From file side, we are the specialized agency.
We do bring technical backbone that underpins global forest data including data tools, methodologies, and so on and so forth.
I'm not going to go into details.
The third point that I wanted to bring is the last mile coordination gap.
I think together, the CPF members are bringing complementarity, science, finance, policy support, technical expertise also in the field.
The one important gap that CPF can collectively and should do is the closing the gap, turning the global commitments to their local actions.
One concrete example that we've done in the recent years is the CPF supported policy coherence work in Africa.
This is an example directly responding to EcoSc resolution 2024 slash 15 on the need for local actions and the need to bring CPF more to the country level, on the policy coherence and cross sectorial collaboration which was also mentioned by some speakers before we did some workshops and work together with Jeff Secretariat, with IUCN, UNP UNDP, and other colleagues in the Rio Convention Secretariat Secretariat in Tanzania, Mozambique and Zambia.
My final point on looking ahead, Over the next 12 months from FAR side, we will continue facilitating our discussions, listening carefully to member states guidance and strengthening coordinations.
From our side from FIO, an important milestone will be COFO 28.
I think it was already mentioned by some member states, which is the committee on forestry which will be held in Rome in FIO headquarters from the 28th of September to the 2nd of October.
We will discuss some of the topics raised by the member states today.
I also wanted to mention that FAO has a Also mandate on agriculture and food security and the topic of forest contribution to food security and nutrition and collaboration of forestry and agriculture is a standing item now that is being considered by COFA and by the Committee of agriculture in FIO.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
To really be clear comparative advantage listed each and every agency whether it's policy, partnership, finance, and all of that.
How do we complement each other? It has to be clear.
Executive Director of ITTU you have the floor.
Thank you, Madam Director of the UNFF Secretariat.
Thank you again as well to all of the member countries who have spoken here and also to all our colleagues from the CPF who have already made statements.
I'll make mine extremely short because again, I made an intervention earlier.
Taking several of the points that were made just now in this last few minutes, concrete action.
Yes, we very much agree that food security and wood security is important.
But from the ITTO's perspective and the mandate that we have to serve our 76 member countries, the income security is equally important.
It's all well and good to say that we must compel countries to stop deforestation.
Some countries are just not in that position to do so.
There are different pressures and needs that do require, I wouldn't say deforestation, but it requires a change in land use.
There should be a buffer zone for these countries to work within, which in a few decades or three or four decades can be corrected.
In that instance, there is also the need to think about the trade.
It's not just using the forests for food, we need to think about value added and processing so that domestic markets are served equally and not just the export orientated markets.
This is where we have been advising countries on looking and implementing incentives through tax rebates, tax breaks even, give them the technology, encourage technology and knowledge sharing between the developed countries and the developing countries and this is what the ITTA is all about.
Go, you don't have to do the roadmap by yourself.
Brazil is not alone in this.
We have the next iteration of the ITTA coming up.
Weave it into the ITTA.
It is a legally binding United Nations Agreement.
Think about it.
Within brackets, within a small percentage, membership should allow for each and every member to benefit from this agreement.
There's so much that can be done through the ITTA.
The next thing I wanted to talk about is in addition to what Margo said about creative tools, we've been doing tracking and traceability projects utilizing digital tools.
We want to do satellite monitoring.
We have a project proposal in the pipeline.
GEF, we may be coming to talk to you soon in the future.
We are looking at the GCF already to help with fire management, particularly in tropical countries.
We're introducing a new toolkit that is adaptable to non tropical countries.
Hopefully by CFR or by the end of the year, this toolkit will be fed into the fire management hub.
It's an integrated fire toolkit.
Next, the last thing I wanted to say is the legal and sustainable supply chains, just as the executive director from Cité mentioned, is equally important not just for the endangered species.
It's also important for the non endangered species so that we can keep track on the commercial species and introduce a joint initiative on planted forests.
This will serve the needs and reduce the pressure on the more precious species and also on natural forests.
The gap that we could address, I think we need to reduce this fragmentation on forests.
Let's stop squeezing each other out.
I see a lot of this happening.
I don't know whether many of you also recognize that, but you're too shy to say it.
I'm not shy to say it.
Why? Because I come from the tropics myself and it's painful.
Let's all work together more and try to see how we can sort this whole mess out.
It is messy at this point, am I right? Sorry, am I being too outspoken here.
It is a bit messy.
But I think I'll just stop there so that our other colleagues get a chance to speak their minds too.
Thank you.
Thank.
Please don't tell me that you'll be brief because I know now what is meant to be brief.
I blocked just this.
Madam Chair, I'll be very brief.
I'll focus on three areas.
I know being in the middle, five before and five after, so it's challenge.
I would like to focus on three areas, reassuring member states IUCN commitment on forests.
Our recently approved program of work and 20 year vision talks about not just forests for climate, biodiversity, and livelihoods, but building on some of the points our member states raised to deliver on a transformation areas, which include just energy transition economies, livelihoods.
Forests for us is central to all this debate and we are going to focus in next four years on those areas, not just our bread and butter of conservation.
The second aspect, more concrete one to report on the progress, we are leading the joint initiative on strengthening conservation of primary forests, which addresses goal one and three.
We are very pleased with the progress.
Last point about the gap, I like the point about the communication.
I would like to highlight two areas.
While communication is important, quite often we are focused on the supply side of things.
What we know we want to preach others.
We don't understand the demand.
From ICN side, we really want to and focus on working with the CPF members to understand what other sectors want to hear from us and how we can tailor our message.
Two points just building on that on that, we heard two important points.
One is on forest soil and the last one is on non forest ecosystems.
These are the topics we don't get enough attention in the CPF discussions.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you very much, San, Daniella? Yes.
Thanks a watching.
I was very happy to hear that promoting knowledge is one of the most important things here and I think is actually the right place to do that.
We are very happy to promote knowledge.
We have done that in a CPF joint initiative, Global Forest Expert Panels and hopefully you have all known about that because we have done that in collaboration with you.
Actually, there was as well a report on forest and food security.
It's already from 2015, but still you might find that interesting.
There is another one about interlinkages between forest people and policies, social economic resilience, or one which was trying to identify the challenges of international forest governance, which very much relates to what we are discussing here.
There was actually the point of fragmentation was highlighted in this report saying that we need to overcome that and gave some opportunities as well and ideas of alternative ways in international forest governance for the future.
One other thing is that we do some joint initiatives together for sustainable good for sustainable world, for example, and others.
So as well maybe to our colleagues from Kenya, we have as well a communicators networks where everybody is invited to join in and there we can join forces in communicating, which is something which is better when we do it together rather than only alone.
That is really cool.
Um, what we've realized is as well that international governance not only takes place at the international level, but very much as well at the regional level.
We are not talking too much about that here, but it is happening in a way and we need to react to that and Aufra tries to do so in having some science policy interaction in particular in Pan European and African region.
We talked about the CLI, but if you're interested in that, you need to move the room.
Maybe what is most important for me when it comes to the gap, I think what nobody's approaching here is, but I know that several of us have realized that in particular at the domestic level, is that the discourses we have on forest management or non forest management are really heating up So it's not only a fragmented discourse, is this a polarized discourse? Can we still use a forest actually? Is it still possible to say so? There are books outside saying, well, titled by the Forest War.
I think we need to approach that.
We need to approach that with knowledge, to understand the drivers, the consequences, but as well to engage with policymakers, general public and to have a constructive discourse in the future.
We are ready to do that.
So for everyone who wants to join in, we are very happy to work on this issue as well for the future with the CPF, but as well with the member countries.
Thank you.
Thank you very much, Mr.
Sasha.
Thank you.
Thank you.
UNFF focal points have emphasized the importance of synergies, and this call is getting louder and louder.
The UN CCD has been a very strong advocate of these complementarities and how to leverage them, how to enjoy the benefits of bringing together not only the RIO conventions, but other processes.
So the land degradation neutrality, as all of you may know, LDN has an established hierarchy that over 130 countries, member states are involved with and are using.
Avoid, reduce, and reverse land degradation.
We're talking about all terrestrial ecosystems, and this addresses multiple forest goals.
The ongoing process of formulation of implementation in a target setting goal oriented framework, um, is really moving the needle in certain countries, in terms of land restoration, in terms of regenerative agriculture, in terms of bringing back productive and healthy lands.
We're working in depth right now in this framework with 18 countries on integrated land use planning.
Uh, spatial planning that is essential for creating a healthy landscape mosaic.
Also within this LDN framework, we are helping countries to mainstream tenure security.
Tenure security is one of our work programs, inclusive governance, as well as gender responsive approaches.
We need to bring the other half of the population or 50% of the population needs to have the same opportunity to contribute to the Forest goals.
I think this was brought up several times in plenary.
And lastly, at our last cop in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, we initiated a new work program on rangelands and pastoralists and countries have identified silver pastoral solutions to enhance drought resilience and to improve rangeland health.
Thank you very much.
Miss Cassey.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
It's a pleasure to be here and even though this is lightning round, it has been immensely useful to hear all of these perspectives.
I must admit, UNDP is not new to these meetings, but I am.
This is my first and it is such a pleasure to be here.
Clearly, these themes of collaboration and integration are critical not only for this work, but I couldn't help thinking about how critical they are at this moment in the world and being able to show that collaboration and integration can deliver real results for people and planet.
At UNDP, many of you know that we have quite an enormous portfolio on this.
We have recently undergone just restructuring at UNDP, where we have combined the portfolios on climate, nature, energy, and pollution prevention.
Again, this is our effort to try to be integrated with this infrastructure.
Of course, through this work in reversing forest loss, we are committed to supporting countries on their climate biodiversity and development planning, in particular on this intersection of NDCs, NBSAPs and ReD plus strategies.
There's a couple of trends here that I think are really important and one of which is that all the latest rounds of NDCs, of all of them, 96% include a reference to forests and land use.
This is an order of magnitude more than what we had seen before.
Another trend that's really interesting is that 72% of these NDCs now include forest measures involving indigenous peoples and local communities.
We're looking at the world changing when it comes to these commitments.
But also, as we were reminded by our colleague from Kenya, Documents can't just be dreams, what you said there.
I think that here now it's about, again, the financing.
It is about capacities, it's about how do we start to turn what sometimes is a sectoral challenge into something that is integrated on the ground.
This is something that we are certainly trying to do between red plus performance based schemes, readiness for high integrity, jurisdictional red plus finance, connecting carbon finance with outcomes, and of course, the innovations coming out of T F.
We're very proud to be a part of this collaborative partnership and very looking forward to working closely together.
Thank you.
Thank you.
I think Kathy's words make my life much easier and I can be even shorter.
A lot have already been said, and I think everyone knows that forest has always been essential part of the Paris Agreement and the FCCC process is really essential part of achieving the Paris Agreement goal.
Then what is new here with the work for us, exactly, we are really going into more and more implementation, helping countries on the ground translating what is on paper into real actions.
One example is that we recently launched the initiative of global Practice of red plus community.
There we really try to work with countries, promote south south collaboration that has been already mentioned by our member states, which is really we consider a critical part because if you want something to happen on the ground, you really need to work with the countries to help them establish a capacity so we're doing something more on the ground.
That's one of the key initiatives, something new from the work at the UNFCCC Secretariat.
Second point I wanted to talk about hearing all the earlier interventions.
I think we're not only talking about doing more with less, we also are talking more about impacts.
Looking at our activities in particular, the CPF collaborative initiatives and activities, whether we're really doing something that really brings the maximum impacts.
We talk about knowledge products, we have a lot of joint publications.
Perhaps we can consider doing some mapping to see where we can use the limited resources to really work on something that will bring the highest impact.
That's my $0.02.
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much and thank you for being brief.
You have the floor.
Thank you very much.
Distinguished delegates and Director Chair.
The World Bank Group is grateful to the member states for their substantive reflection.
Turning to the first guiding question and concrete joint actions and commitments in support of the global Force goal one, three, and five.
The World Bank Group is advancing the following measurable delivery.
On goal one, our Forest Carbon Partnership facility is providing result based payment for verified emission reduction from deforestation across 15 country in tropical forest nation.
On goal three, our recently approved sustainable Concho Basin Forest economies program representing nearly $400 million is operationalizing the principle that sustainable forest management and inclusive economic development are mutually reinforcing objectives.
On goal five, through our forest and biodiversity global Challenge Program, we are systematically investing in the governance frameworks, land to new security, and institutional capacities that member states have identified as foundational to durable forest protection.
On the second guiding question regarding the collaboration gap as the CPF should prioritize, the Word Bank Group considers the most critical gap to be the absence of a shared institution wide framework for measuring and communicating the employment and livelihood dividend of forest investments.
Our commitment for the next 12 months is to lead the proposed CPF joining initiative on forest and jobs, developing jointly with CPF partners organization, a common indicator framework, launching country pilots and producing the evidence base that will broaden the constituency for forest investment to include finance ministers and the private sector.
We look forward to the collective engagement of CPF members in advancing this initiative.
Thank you.
Thank you very much, Mr.
Lefeuv I wish we could have a bit of time for interactive discussion.
Unfortunately, we can't.
And we have now to move on to the closing remarks, but allow me just to say a few will.
Distinguish representative of member state, you've heard our distinguished head and representative of CPF member organization.
They have all that is needed.
They have the solution, they have the tools to your problems.
But in as much as the whole of government approach and cross sectoral coordination are really crucial on the ground.
CPF member must also lead by example, by supporting in a more coordinated manner.
So we need to think of what we mean when we talk about comparative advantage.
What do we mean when we talk about joint initiative? I think that will help us to be really more effective and efficient in delivering tangible benefit to people and especially to the forest dependent communities.
So it's now my pleasure to invite Martin Krause Krause? Yeah.
Yeah.
Vice Chair of CPF and Director of the Climate Change Division of the United Nations Environment Program to provide closing remarks.
Miss Krause, you have the floor.
Thank you.
Thank you very much, Juliet, and I will not be brief.
Ah.
Because if I would be brief, I would go on forever.
That's what we have learned, one of the lessons learned here in this room in the last hour and a half, so I cannot be brief.
I'm tempted to summarize everything that has been said, which is an impossible task, of course, but what I have realized the wisdom in this room here in the last hour and a half, if we would only implement half or one third of what has been said here, I think we would make very important and stride forwards in implementing our global forest agenda.
Now, there is clearly a political momentum when it comes to forests.
I can see that.
Not last because we have the, the Brazilian roadmap on deforestation, which is really an impetus for all of us, I think that are working on forests.
There is this political momentum.
The question is for us and especially for the CPF on how to turn this political momentum into action into implementation.
What can we do to grease the wheels, so to speak, as the CPF? One of the topics that came up repeatedly, of course, is finance and I just want to point out one thing.
In Santa Marta, when we were discussing the transitioning away from fossil fuel roadmap, there was a lot of emphasis on subsidies that are going into the fossil fuel sector.
If we don't address subsidies in the fossil fuel sector, it will be very hard, if not impossible to move away and transition away from fossil fuels.
Now here, we're talking about the forest sector and yesterday I've mentioned one number that I wanted to repeat, almost $9 trillion is held in companies that are threatening and destroying forests.
As long as we are not able to reverse that in a way, we are up against an enemy impossible to fight.
In all our efforts of protecting forests and that is our language, that is our narrative and has been for decades, we are protecting forests will be futile if we are not addressing root causes of those who are making money in destroying forests.
We need to have a closer look at that and see what we can do and some of the solutions were mentioned here, tax incentives and so on, to provide financial instruments and incentives and Garo you have pointed that also out.
I in terms of creating a market, not working against the market, but creating a market.
This is one of the challenges, I think.
We need to move away from a narrative of protecting because that means something is passive and weak because we cannot work against the market, we need to embrace opportunities need to value the assets and the loss of assets all the assets that the forests bring in the health sector and so on and so forth, in the food systems, and so on.
This is our challenge, I believe, as the CPF and as a group that cares about these things.
Last thing, we have a retreat as a CPF early next year, we said in January, February.
Hope that a lot of the thoughts that you have articulated here we can take into that retreat and come up not with a recipe, not with solutions, but that could help us to recalibrate maybe the work of the CPF to support this important agenda.
Thank you.
I, I wish to underscore that the period following UNFF 21 will be critical for identifying how the CPF and its member can best support accelerated progress toward the global forest goals by 2030.
This includes responding to the priorities expressed by member state, strengthening country led support, and building on the comparative advantage of CPF members through more coherent and coordinated action.
The UNFF Secretariat stand ready to continue working closely with CPF members and member states to facilitate active engagement and support for the implementation of the UNFF 21 outcome.
I thank you very much for your valuable contribution.
Thank you for your patience.
Thank you.
Shall we take a group photo.