Guyana has gained such credibility on the international stage where climate change discussions are concerned, that from July this year, the country will co-chair the International REDD plus Partnership, a voluntary alliance of rainforest countries and donors, aimed at scaling up REDD-plus actions and finance.
This is according to President Bharrat Jagdeo, who delivered the feature address at the opening of a seminar to mark UN International Year of Forests, held on Monday at the Guyana International Conference Centre (GICC). He noted that Germany was the other co-chair from the developed countries, as the structure allows for a co-chair each from developing and developed nations.
Speaking to the Guyana Chronicle on Monday, Guyana’s lead negotiator to the UNFCCC, Andrew Bishop said Guyana announced its candidacy some months ago, but was formally elected at recent meetings in Bangkok, Thailand, in the margin of UN climate change talks there.
“The decision for Guyana to serve as co-chair from July 1, 2011 was unanimous, from a field that included all of the major rainforest countries of the world and REDD donors,” Bishop said.
Through its ascension to the co-chair, Guyana will seek to ramp up the Partnership’s activities from its current baseline work to greater advocacy for scaled up REDD actions and results-based payments for rainforest countries.
Bishop said the International REDD Partnership will neither replace the formal UNFCCC negotiations on REDD-plus, and neither will it prejudice them. “It will help to inform the UNFCCC negotiations,” he said.
“This alliance includes close to 40 rainforest countries, and approximately 10 to 15 other partners on the donor side,” he said, adding: “One of the things that the partnership has done is to establish a database system that could be shared by all rainforest countries, so we can see what each other is doing, we can share experiences, we can share data.”
Giving an example of what he meant, he said Guyana’s avoided deforestation model could be put on the database for other countries to learn from.
He said the body has been doing a lot of baseline work, such as what the needs of the countries are, assessing what the current level of resources are for REDD-plus, and assessing what the gaps are.
“So the partnership is involved in what [we refer to] as a needs assessment and a gap analysis with regards to what is needed by REDD countries to conserve their forests and practice sustainable forest management, and what gaps exist between the level of resources out there and the level of resources that they need,” he said.
Bishop said the partnership has been involved in a third area, which is looking at the effectiveness of the multilateral agencies in delivering on REDD-plus. “This takes the form of a study, looking at for example the World Bank, UN REDD, looking at how they are operating and to what extent they have been effective, and perhaps to make recommendations on how to improve the effectiveness at the institutional level,” the technocrat said.
This is according to President Bharrat Jagdeo, who delivered the feature address at the opening of a seminar to mark UN International Year of Forests, held on Monday at the Guyana International Conference Centre (GICC). He noted that Germany was the other co-chair from the developed countries, as the structure allows for a co-chair each from developing and developed nations.Speaking to the Guyana Chronicle on Monday, Guyana’s lead negotiator to the UNFCCC, Andrew Bishop said Guyana announced its candidacy some months ago, but was formally elected at recent meetings in Bangkok, Thailand, in the margin of UN climate change talks there.
“The decision for Guyana to serve as co-chair from July 1, 2011 was unanimous, from a field that included all of the major rainforest countries of the world and REDD donors,” Bishop said.
Through its ascension to the co-chair, Guyana will seek to ramp up the Partnership’s activities from its current baseline work to greater advocacy for scaled up REDD actions and results-based payments for rainforest countries.
Bishop said the International REDD Partnership will neither replace the formal UNFCCC negotiations on REDD-plus, and neither will it prejudice them. “It will help to inform the UNFCCC negotiations,” he said.
“This alliance includes close to 40 rainforest countries, and approximately 10 to 15 other partners on the donor side,” he said, adding: “One of the things that the partnership has done is to establish a database system that could be shared by all rainforest countries, so we can see what each other is doing, we can share experiences, we can share data.”
Giving an example of what he meant, he said Guyana’s avoided deforestation model could be put on the database for other countries to learn from.
He said the body has been doing a lot of baseline work, such as what the needs of the countries are, assessing what the current level of resources are for REDD-plus, and assessing what the gaps are.
“So the partnership is involved in what [we refer to] as a needs assessment and a gap analysis with regards to what is needed by REDD countries to conserve their forests and practice sustainable forest management, and what gaps exist between the level of resources out there and the level of resources that they need,” he said.
Bishop said the partnership has been involved in a third area, which is looking at the effectiveness of the multilateral agencies in delivering on REDD-plus. “This takes the form of a study, looking at for example the World Bank, UN REDD, looking at how they are operating and to what extent they have been effective, and perhaps to make recommendations on how to improve the effectiveness at the institutional level,” the technocrat said.
Its good to see that after gain much credibility on the international stage in the fight to combat climate change,Guyana will be co-chairing the REDD partnership.Also that the Guyana's model will be put so that other countries could learn for it.
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