A Cautionary note on reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD)

The establishment of an international system to provide support and incentives for Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD) has been put forward as a key pillar of a post-2012
international climate change regime, and it is emerging as a global blueprint to reduce emissions from land-use change. It is believed that REDD will increase developing countries’ financial resources to fight deforestation and that it will also increase the well-being of rural and indigenous communities through the provision of economic incentives and the recognition of their role as forest stewards.

Against such high expectations, however, we argue below that such “REDD optimism” must be put in quarantine in the light of financial and implementation challenges, divergent institutional, technical and governance capacities and the risk of benefiting powerful actors at the expense of indigenous peoples and low income communities.