REDD countries

Nationally, Mexico is implementing numerous activities as part of its REDD+ readiness phase and in support of the development of its National REDD+ Strategy, including actions for the development of the MRV system and for developing local and institutional capacity for REDD+ implementation. These include the actions under the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF) and the Forest Investment Program (FIP).

The Federal Government through the National Forestry Commission (Comisión Nacional Forestal; CONAFOR) is driving the development of ‘Early Actions’ (Acciones Tempranas) in Mexico’s Early Action Areas; the states of Oaxaca, Chiapas, Jalisco, Campeche, Yucatán and Quintana Roo, which are cumulatively responsible for the majority (70%) of net deforestation in Mexico. The aim of these activities is to explore different scalable arrangements for future implementation of REDD+. These activities aim to integrate with existing programmes for sustainable rural development and sustainable forest management and therefore promote public policy alignment.

A number of REDD+ related projects are being implemented by national and international non-governmental organisations. For example, the Mexican Civil Council for Sustainable Silviculture (Consejo Civil Mexicano para la Silvicultura Sostenible; CCMSS) is working in a number of municipalities and forest regions to develop REDD+ strategies as part of its ‘REDD Community’ project, and AMBIO (La Cooperative Ambio S. C. de R. L.) has established two carbon forestry projects; a REDD pilot project in the Selva el Ocote Biosphere Reserve and the Scolel’Té project in Oaxaca and Chiapas. International NGOS active in Mexico include those working to implement the M-REDD (Mexico’s Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation) Programme;  a result of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the governments of the United States of America and Mexico. The M-REDD is being implemented by a consortium of international and Mexican conservation organisations in the guise of the M-REDD Alliance, which includes the Rainforest Alliance, the Mexican Fund for the Conservation of Nature (Fondo Mexicano para la Conservación de la Naturaleza), Woods Hole Research Center, Winrock International and the Nature Conservancy.

Few of Mexico’s REDD+ activities cover all aspects of REDD+ and therefore the majority will serve as examples and provide lessons learned for future implementation of REDD+ at different levels. A number of activities are aimed at promoting capacity for REDD+ in Mexico, including those that support the development of the MRV system and enhance local capacity for such systems. The ‘Forest Monitoring Capacity Building Project’, for example, is being implemented by the Mexican Fund for the Conservation of Nature and aims to directly support seven civil society organisations in building capacity among 16 forest communities in forest monitoring technologies.

The states of Chiapas and Campeche are part of the Governors’ Climate and Forests Task Force (GCF), a multi-jurisdictional collaborative effort established between 19 states and provinces from Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, Nigeria, Peru, Spain and the U.S. The GCF supports the development of the appropriate technical, legal and institutional frameworks for comprehensive cross jurisdictional REDD+ and low emissions rural development initiatives (GCF, 2012).  The GCF has been working in collaboration with the REDD Offset Working Group (ROW) and their partners, the California Air Resources Board (ARB), to develop a framework for the incorporation of international REDD credits in California’s cap and trade compliance market (FCMC, 2012). The ROW was established in February 2011 as a result of Memorandum of Understanding, signed in November 2010, between the governors of California (U.S.), Chiapas (Mexico) and Acre (Brazil) as part of a collaborative effort to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+). The ROW aims to understand the legal and institutional mechanisms required, and the policy considerations, in order for California’s compliance market to recognise international REDD credits (ROW, 2012).