Program Feasibility Note for Reducing Emissions from All Land Uses (REALU) activities in Bac Kan province, Vietnam

Vietnam is one of the pilot countries for both Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD) and Reducing Emissions from All Land Uses (REALU) initiatives. Land use, land use change and forestry contributes 17-20% of the global greenhouse gas emissions. Recognizing the important role played by this sector in combating climate change, the United Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) included REDD into the ongoing negotiations and formulated the Bali action plan at the 13th Conference Of Parties in 2007. Since then large scale initiatives have been taken up in several tropical countries focused on REDD and REDD+ (protection and conservation of existing forests including restocking and regeneration). These initiatives include the United Nations – REDD (UN-REDD) program, the Forest Carbon Partnership Facility, and the Forest Investment Program. The main thrust of the international effort on REDD+, however, has been on conserving forest areas without due consideration to carbon rich lands that lie outside the officially demarcated forestlands. A related concern is that in many tropical countries, significant tree cover lies outside the forest areas, while the officially demarcated forestlands may have little tree cover. Hence, the REALU approach that emphasizes the need for covering carbon emissions from land uses through a cross-sectoral landscape level planning, complements the ongoing REDD+ initiatives.Vietnam has seen a dramatic change in forest cover in the last 60 years. Although, the proportion of land under forest cover declined from 43% in 1943 to 20% in 1993, large scale plantations and forest regeneration since then increased the forest area to 13.564 million ha (representing 39% of the total land) in 2009. On average, the country has gained forests at more than 2% per annum over the last 20 years, making it one of the few tropical countries on the right side of the forest transition curve. However, the national figure masks wide variations in forest cover in different parts of the country. Deforestation is a major problem in Central Highlands, while significant forest cover is also being lost in the north central region. Similarly, coastal mangrove forests have witnessed a large scale deforestation, with an average decline of 15,000 ha/year between 1985 and 2000. Another related issue is of forest degradation. Even though forest cover has increased in many parts of the country, the quality of forests has not. While less than 1% of the land area is now under primary forests, more than 2/3rd of the natural forests are considered poor or regenerating. Forest conservation and management through REDD+ initiatives has ample scope at the national and sub-national level. The main agency to manage land is the Ministry of Natural Resource and Environment (MONRE) while the administration of forest and forestry land is under the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD). Both MONRE and MARD have corresponding departments at the province and district levels.The Government of Vietnam has taken several important initiatives to conserve forests and to decentralize forest management in the country. Although all land is owned by the state, under the 2003 Land Law and the Decision 181 passed in 2004 as part of the Forest Protection and Development Law, forest land can be allocated to local people in various forms: individual households, groups of households, and village communities. The forest land can be allocated in the form of ‘red book certificates’ for 50 years, renewable for another 50 years. Another important initiative is the Decision 380 introduced in 2008, under which local people can receive Payments for Forest Environmental Services (PFES). After the piloting of PFES in Lam Dong and Son La provinces, the program is now being planned for large scale replication throughout the country. Under PFES, the government is also establishing a Forest Protection and Development Fund (FPDF) which will channel public and private funding to local people for forestry activities. In order to calibrate the payments to local context, the government has envisaged ‘K coefficients’ that will determine the specific payment depending on the state of forests and other natural parameters.Both these initiatives have strong bearing on the scope of REDD+ program in Vietnam. Under a fair and effective Benefit Distribution System (BDS), the government is open to sharing international REDD+ revenue with local people that are involved in forest protection and management. The sub-technical working groups under the national REDD+ program are looking at the feasibility of establishing a sub-REDD fund under the FPDF that can provide payments to local people on the basis of REDD or ‘R coefficients’. However, there are concerns regarding the equity element especially when a large proportion of the population does not possess red book certificates. Another concern is how to balance the need for upfront benefits to community members with performance based payments that are conditional on emission reduction. Other concerns include the limitation of REDD payments in addressing drivers of deforestation that lie outside the forest areas and in sufficiently compensating community members/forest managers for their opportunity costs.Integrating REDD+ programs with the landscape level approach promoted by REALU can help address many of these concerns. Instead of providing payments for only forest conservation activities, REALU incentivizes community members for conserving all carbon rich land uses. In addition, cross-sectoral planning helps governments in formulating policies that are effective in addressing drivers of deforestation, while providing long term incentives to community members to adopt sustainable land use practices. Considering that the experience with REDD+ in Vietnam has been mainly limited to national level, and that demonstration activities will be needed in the field to add momentum to the present initiative, ICRAF Vietnam decided to focus the sub-national activities under REALU to Bac Kan province.

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