Since it was founded, Forest Trends’ mission has been to put markets and finance to work for conservation, rather than at its expense.
As carbon-absorbing ecosystems like forests become more and more instrumental in the fight against climate change, Forest Trends has set out to promote market-based incentives that give value to the climate benefits those ecosystems provide. In doing so, we hope to accelerate the global transition to the robust, low-carbon economies of the future.
Our work using markets to fight climate change cuts across the public and private sectors, forging new and diverse alliances capable of lowering greenhouse gas emissions – especially through forest conservation and more sustainable land use.
Read More...We track projects around the world that protect or restore forests, produce renewable energy, or take other steps to reduce carbon emissions – in the process generating carbon offsets. These offsets, once rigorously verified by third-party sources, are purchased by companies, governments, and individuals seeking to ramp up their own climate action by offsetting a portion of their emissions.
Offsets flow through both voluntary markets (for example, when a company offsets a portion of its emissions to meet internal sustainability targets) and compliance markets (for example, when a business acts to comply with regulatory requirements), as well as other market-based mechanisms that don’t fit neatly into either category.
The annual State of the Voluntary Carbon Markets report from our Ecosystem Marketplace initiative is the authoritative resource for data and analysis related to the voluntary carbon market, which has emerged as a potent testing ground for market-based climate action.
Meanwhile, the annual State of Forest Carbon Finance report looks exclusively at offsets tied to forest and land-use emissions reductions, but includes in its analysis compliance markets around the world.
We look for opportunities within the landmark Paris Agreement for markets to scale up countries’ ambition for reducing emissions. Article 6 of the Paris Agreement allows for national governments to use carbon markets on a voluntary basis, and Forest Trends is actively working with countries and partners to create, where appropriate, robust carbon markets with environmental integrity and strong social safeguards.
Forest Trends is also exploring opportunities for national governments to enlist private sector participation in this area, particularly through the UN program Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation, or REDD+. This support is critical if countries are to achieve their commitments under the Paris Agreement, and our experts have identified a range of policy “carrots” and “sticks” governments can use to spur businesses to act, either voluntarily or in order to comply with domestic law.
We leverage new combinations of funding – public and private, domestic and international – to scale up forest conservation and “climate-smart” agriculture. Forest Trends works in key tropical forest countries, like Brazil and Peru, to find creative approaches that leverage public and private finance together to overcome existing obstacles to large-scale sustainable agriculture.
We research market-based investments in “green infrastructure” that make communities and the landscapes they call home more resilient to climate change. Governments, water utilities, companies, and communities around the world invest in cost-effective, nature-based solutions, like healthy forests, wetlands, grasslands, and mangroves that help secure reliable access to clean water – and our Ecosystem Marketplace initiative tracks these investments in our State of Watershed Investments report series.
We also promote market-based mechanisms to help private industries reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. In late 2016, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) agreed to allow the airline industry to use a global carbon market-based measure known as the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (CORSIA) to achieve its carbon-neutral growth pledge.
The specifics of the plan are still evolving, but it leaves the door open for the aviation industry to meet its industry-wide goal of climate-neutral growth through the use of forest-based carbon credits, which would provide a critical infusion of funding to help protect the world’s forests.
