Outreach Meeting for COP30's Roadmap on Halting and Reversing Deforestation and Forest Degradation by 2030 (UNFF21 Side Event)

Yes, hello, ladies and gentlemen. Shall we start? Yes. Thank you all very much for coming. We're very happy to see this full room here. We believe we are involved in something very interesting and important. And the fact that you're here with us, I think, points to the fact that some people agree with us, so we're very happy. Just some housekeeping information for the moment. So we have interpretation in English, that's channel one, French, channel two, Russian, channel three, Spanish, channel four. So feel free to switch if you feel more comfortable. And since we have many interesting things to talk about in limited time, so I will switch directly to Start our, just a moment. Yeah, sorry. I'm doing organizing and sharing at the same time. So, yeah. So as you probably know, in the closing of UNFCCC COP30 in Belém last year, the COP30 presidency took the innovative decision to offer to the world two roadmaps, which will be non-negotiated documents, as I said, presented to the world, pointing the way for countries to implement commitments that we have already taken together in the global stocktake of the Paris Agreement, but several of those commitments actually are precede the GST, but were reiterated there and afterwards. So, for instance, we're here to discuss ways and means to implement our joint commitment to halt and reverse deforestation and forest degradation by 2030. The issue of deforestation was already in fact in Global Forest Goal number one. I don't need to teach you that. And the broader commitment was also taken on by most countries at COP26 in Glasgow in 2021. And they were all reiterated, in fact, last year in General Assembly Resolution 79/1, the Pact for the Future. So we're no longer discussing whether or not we have committed to halting and reversing deforestation and forest degradation by 2030. We're discussing how to get there. And this is precisely what we are attempting to do with this roadmap. And we are, although, as I said, it is not a negotiated document because the CMA didn't give us a specific mandate for that, but we understand we didn't really need a mandate because this is already agreed tax from the global stocktake from 2023. So it is an implementation matter. And the COP30 presidency is just taking the initiative to suggest ways for us to get there. It is not an easy task at all. In fact, we believe this is something, it's a level of ambition comparable to that of the Paris Agreement itself, meeting the 1.5 degree temperature threshold. It's very difficult, but we know we need to do it, and we're serious about it. That's why we are undertaking this initiative. And we are doing our best to make as good a text as we can. That's why we're drawing on knowledge from all over the world, and that's why we are investing a lot of time and effort in consulting parties and stakeholders. We started this in February, as you probably know, the COP30 president issued an invitation to the whole world to present, contribute text to this roadmap, and we were very positively surprised with the reaction. We received written contributions from over 130 countries individually or in groups, so that's way more than half of the UN membership, including most of the large forest countries in the world. Some of them are sitting around this table here. And we also receive contributions from over 150 international organizations of many times either registered at the UNFCCC or not registered at the UNFCCC, individuals, researchers, research institutions, and also nine UN bodies. As a matter of fact, we are having a very positive cooperation with several UN bodies, starting with the UNFCCC secretariat represented here right beside me, but This event is being co-sponsored also, not only by the UNFCCC Secretariat, but also by the FAO, UNDP, and UNEP. And so we are in very good company. And the drafting effort is being carried out together with the Climate Policy Initiative. I have here by my side Professor Julien Masson-Saint, who is the director of this initiative and a leading climate economist himself. So we are investing this effort to hear the world, to learn from all the knowledge that is around this table and elsewhere in the world, but also to make sure we produce a document which is as representative as possible. As I said, this is no longer the moment of negotiation. The goals were already agreed. But of course, we want to be as much representative as possible of the views of the international community. So that's why we're making a series of events like these, like this one here. And so next month in Bonn, we will have probably three new meetings, two already confirmed, but probably one also with indigenous peoples and local communities. And then we were planning to have side events also in the other two Rio Convention Rio Conventions COPs, meaning desertification in Mongolia, then biodiversity in Armenia, and possibly also at the Committee on Forestry, COFO, in Rome with the FAO. We've been partnering with the FAO, as a matter of fact, already since February, and also with UNAP. So we think we are We're doing our best to make as good a document as possible and as legitimate a document as possible. So that's why we invited you all to continue this conversation, get feedback from all of you. And we are also very happy to be here at the house of UNFF with the presence of Ms. Juliet Bial, the director of UNFF, who will offer us her final comments in the closing of the meeting. So since time is short, I will already pass the floor to Ms. Wang Xuehong, who is the leading person with regard to forests in the UNFCCC Secretariat. Please, Ms. Wang, you have the floor. Five minutes, please.

Thank you. You can hear me, right? So thank you, Marco Tullio, and good afternoon, dear colleagues, dear friends. So first of all, I would like to thank COP30 Presidency for the initiative and for organizing this event. I would also like to extend my thank you to the co-sponsors, as Marco Trulio just now mentioned, for this very, very important event. It's a pleasure to join you today on behalf of the UNFCCC Secretariat. We all know that forests are central to climate action, biodiversity, sustainable development, and the livelihoods of millions of people, including indigenous peoples and local communities. Achieving the goals of the Paris Agreement will not be possible without protecting and restoring forests. This is why Forests have long been an integral part of the UNFCCC process. In particular, as we heard already this morning, the Voluntary Framework for REDD+ under the UNFCCC process provides guidance on transparency and forest monitoring and support for results-based action. Forests are also reflected in nationally determined contributions, the so-called NDCs, adaptation plans, and long-term development strategies. The first global stocktake under the Paris Agreement also sent a very strong political signal on forest. Parties recognized the need to halt and reverse deforestation and forest degradation by 2030. In this context, the COP30 Presidency's roadmap is both timely and important. The roadmap is a key opportunity to take stock of where we are, highlight approaches that are working, and identify the remaining gaps and challenges. This kind of political visibility can help strengthen international cooperation and connect ongoing efforts across the UNFCCC process. It also connects well with the recent initiatives under the UNFCCC, including the REDD+ community of practice, which promotes South-South exchange and collaboration on forest and climate action. From the perspective of the UNFCCC Secretariat, several elements will be particularly important. First, implementation must remain country-driven and aligned with national circumstances and priorities. Second, finance is critical. Many developing countries continue to face challenges in accessing adequate and predictable support for forest-related action. REDD+ framework is really one of the effective vehicles to help unlock finance for many developing country parties. Scaling up finance, including high integrity carbon market approaches, will be essential. Third, transparency and credible monitoring systems remain fundamental for building trust and accountability. And finally, meaningful engagement. of indigenous peoples and local community must remain at the center of these efforts. So the UNFCCC Secretariat remains committed to supporting parties and the COP presidencies in advancing forest-related climate action under the Convention and the Paris Agreement. Thank you.

Thank you very much. I'd like now to invite Mr. Martin Krause, Director of Climate Change, the Climate Change Division of UNEP. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Marco. Thank you for convening us. Thank you for creating this roadmap, and thanks for the invitation to be here. Forest loss can be quantified. Forest loss has a measurable price, yet that price is mostly invisible. Why? Because we are not putting it on the right balance sheets. UNEP's analysis on high-risk tropical forests puts numbers on something that has long been treated as unquantifiable. Protecting high-risk tropical forests can help to avoid an estimated 81 billion US dollars loss in climate-related damages annually. And that is a measurable number. The problem is that this number does not appear in any national budget. It shows up instead in hydropower revenue losses, in agricultural productivity declines, in infrastructure repair bills, and in humanitarian response costs. Finance ministries and infrastructure investors are paying for forest loss right now without knowing it. Another example, 25 million materially poor people depend on high-risk tropical forests for fuel wood and non-timber forest products. When forest loss hits them, The cost shows up in social protection budget and poverty statistics, and not in deforestation accounts. This is the core accounting failure. Forest loss is diffuse, delayed, and distributed across sectors that do not see themselves as forest stakeholders. The COP30 Presidency Roadmap has the potential to make that case explicitly and also to audiences that are beyond the forest community. So quantifying the cost of losing forests is one thing. Calculating the cost of keeping them is something else. The challenge for the roadmap, as far as we can see, is not to restate the 2030 goals on deforestation, but to clarify what is needed to deliver them. Drivers for deforestation are complex, context-specific, and often linked to broader land use systems, commodity markets, infrastructure governance, political economy, and finance. The roadmap should address all these, not just the visible ones. On finance, Annual forest finance stood at approximately 84 billion US dollars in 2023, but should reach 300 billion by 2030. The private forest finance was just 7.5 billion US dollars in 2023, while private financial institutions held an estimated 8.9 trillion in financing to companies with high deforestation risk. The money exists, but it is flowing in the wrong direction. The Forest Finance Roadmap, developed by Brazil, UNEP, and the FCLP, already lays out six solutions to close this finance gap, from the TFFF, the J-REDD+, to debt management reform. The Presidency Roadmap can build on it and encourage coherence versus fragmentation, helping countries and partners move from isolated solutions to a more coherent implementation agenda. I was in Santa Marta a few weeks ago, where there was another coalition of the willing coming together. The conference showed that energy transition has shifted from just being a policy debate to becoming a market reality. And this has direct consequences for forests. We have seen that a global energy system that is built on fossil fuels is inherently volatile. People feel it at the gas station, in food prices, and electricity bills. At the same time, renewables are now cheaper in most markets. The shift to electrification is no longer policy-driven, it is market-driven. And that changes the speed of the transition. A faster energy transition means a faster restructuring of land use and commodity markets. And that brings us directly to why we are here. When land use changes, forests are either protected or they pay the price. And that is why the 2030 roadmap to halt and reverse deforestation is so important. To use science, finance, policy, and local experience to make forests visible in the economic decision making before the costs of forest loss appear elsewhere in the economy. Let me close with a final point. The world is restructuring its economy. Energy, land use, commodity markets, all of them are shifting fast. And in every major economic transition in history, forests have paid the price. And that is not because anyone decided they should, but because no one explicitly decided they should not. Forests are not facing one pressure, they are facing many, arriving at the same time from different directions. The COP30 roadmap can help bring all of these things together, the policies, finance, partnership, and cooperation that is needed to turn the existing commitments into concrete results for forests, for people, and the planet. Thank you.

Thank you very much. We've had an unforeseen situation here that the speaker from Brazil, he'll have to hurry to another meeting. So I'll just reverse the order and invite him to speak now, and then we continue the opening. I apologize, but everybody will speak. I'll just reverse the order a little bit. So please, Mr. Garo Batmangian, he's the director of the Brazilian Forestry Service. He'll speak about our experience with the Amazon forest.

Yes. Thank you very much. Thank you, Marco. Adam Bial, good to see you. Very good to be at UNFF again and have this important discussion. What I'm going to present here is not the presidencies, it's about Brazil, what we're doing in Brazil over the last 20 years. And what we're doing is the plans to prevent and control deforestation. We do each one of those plans for each biome. If we go to FAO classification, we have four different biomes, forest biomes, the Atlantic Forest, the Cerrado, the Amazon, and the Caatinga. So each one of them has its own plan. And its own timeline, which is very important also. When you're doing the roadmap, we may not get there at the same time all the time, but important to have the roadmap. So the main points are that all our plans are two-pronged. First, we have a part on promoting sustainable land use, not only forest, but also land use. And the second part, yes, to control illegal activities, so command and control. It's also a whole of the government approach. Although I'm speaking from the forest service side, we include all the ministries that can do anything about it, like agriculture, et cetera, and all the levels of government, municipality, states, and federal. We also do a lot of buy-in, discussing with academia, with NGOs, with the stakeholders, you know, the private sector and the people on the ground to see whether the plan makes sense. And then we create the right legal framework to make this thing work in the long term. So it's not something that is done by a guy, a person. And then we have very transparent objectives and monitoring tools. I'm going to do that for the Amazon, which is the one, the fastest one next. So we have 13 ministries working on three levels of government in the Amazon plan. That's 145 different activities by the different 13 ministers, and that includes justice, agriculture, mining, of course, environment, development, a regional development. All of them work together under the framework, under a chapeau, coordinated by the presidency of the country and the Minister of Environment. We have done the consultations and we'll show the decrees and the monitoring tools, you know very well, is our space agency has the tools. It's very reliable, it's almost considered as a gold standard for tropical forest countries. It's been there since '85. Even when governments wanted to change it, the government fired the director but could not change the number. That shows how reliable, and that's why you need to have the frameworks and the legal basis for doing that. It's very transparent. Next. So I'm giving you some examples. On my side, we do sustainable forest management. We're now going to increase from 1 million to 5 million the area of the forest, sustainable forest management in public areas in Brazil. That will supply a great deal of the timber that is used. That's the first time we already did in the Brazilian stock market. And we had seven bidders for each one of the auctions, and we got the 47 percent higher price than the minimum that we request. So there is an appetite to do that once we put the framework in place. We also did during COP30, we launched the first concession, which is based on restoration, which is based for carbon, which is based on carbon credit. I happen to be on the two pictures, so I know that this happened. Next. On the other side, we're doing investing on sustainable agriculture. We are improving with Embrapa, with our agriculture research center. We are doing, you know, increasing productivity of cattle ranching and other uses. So therefore, there is less demand for the area, and you include, you can restore degraded pastures. for agriculture, for sustainable agriculture, sustainable ranching. That's also important. So you just decrease the pressure in the case of the Amazon, the pressure comes from ranching, so that you decrease that pressure. We have put out bonds that raise 120 billion reais, that will be $54 billion just for, $25 billion, just for this for this enterprise. So again, the private sector has a lot of appetite for this. Next one. We also have, we haven't forgot, of course, the people in the forest. So the people in the forest, we create the program called Green Purse, Bolsa Verde in Brazil. So the forest dwellers, those that live in the forest, are receiving now payments to continue living there and continue doing what they're doing on extractive use, on being forest dwellers. And it's a supplement on their income. 60, this is actually, I checked yesterday, we are close to 100,000 families now, and we have close to 300,000 square kilometers already under the area that these people work and keep as a forest steward. So you see, we work on the agriculture side, we work on the forest side, but we also work with the forest dwellers. On the other side, next, we, of course, we already lost 19% of the forest, so we have large programs for forest restoration. We have a target for 200 million hectares. And again, we have our investment bank, several ministries working together to do restoration at the small and medium size scale as well. Those are some of the programs we have there, just an example, next. We have, I'm not gonna go through this, I know you have a lot of discussions on this over the week, but we have now a fire management policy, which includes prescribed burning, but also how to prevent it, how to combat, and how to support those that are affected by fire. It's a very comprehensive program. The next one is, and then we come to command and control. We have strengthened enforcement. I'm not gonna go all the numbers on the initiatives we did, but it's very important to say that we launched the Center for International Police Cooperation in the Amazon, CCPI, is based in Manaus, in a city inside the Amazon, and includes all the Amazon countries. So it's a good cooperation because there is a lot of border exchanges on timber, fish, et cetera, which also cause a lot of degradation. So we need to act as a region. Next. And then we, an example of law, we just creating the Brazilian system for trading carbon emissions that will be very good for restoration, that will be good for forest planting, because you have a cap and trade system. So that gives an example of a law that we just created. Next. So what are the results? Well, all this effort, next one, this is what we had. It was already somewhat stable. until 2015, then we had some political changes. It got worse in the last administration, but we now, again, reaffirm implementing the current plan, the current version of the plan, and deforestation decrease rapidly from 2022 to 2025. That's a 50% decrease, and hopefully this year will be the lowest ever recorded since we start recording it, as it goes this way. I know that from there to zero, it's like high fever to low fever, but you still have a little bit of fever. But the plan continues to go. This is not a government plan, it's a Brazil plan, and that's why the laws and the programs Our long-term, the green purse has been there for a while. The law for exchanging carbon is there for a while, or will be there for a while. So we believe that this is an example of how the other countries can follow, or, you know, we'd be glad to discuss with you how we did this and how the others can do it as well. Thank you, Marco.

Thanks a lot. So we move back to the final words in the final participants in the introduction here. I'm delighted to invite Mr. Wu Jimin. He's the director of the Forestry Division of the FAO and also the leader of the Collaborative Partnership on Forests. Please, Mr. Wu, you have the floor.

Thank you, Michael. Distinguished delegates, dear colleagues. It's our honor to be part of this process as a co-sponsor of this side event and also as a close partner of the initiative under the leadership of Brazil as the COP28 presidency to formulate and, yeah, in the future, to implement this roadmap for halting and reversing deforestation and forest degradation by 2030. I think at the moment, the world is facing great challenges in forestry, and we are now promoting the balanced approach to the protective and productive functions of forests. At the same time, we need to address three major issues. Firstly, continuous loss of forests and forest degradation. And secondly, we need to encourage members and partners to implement large scale afforestation, reforestation, and say land restoration, say programs. And thirdly, we need to produce more with less. So I'm so glad to see that all these three major issues are addressed by our members. right, for this continuous forest loss and degradation issue. Now we have this roadmap. And for the land, say, restoration, we have UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration. We have another new UN decade for forestation, reforestation to be launched next year. And thirdly, we have this kind of sustainable forest based say, bioeconomies, right, led by Austria and Finland. So this kind of, yes, global initiatives are underway. So back to the, say, forest and bio forest and climate change, I think we can't achieve the goals of Paris Agreement without forest. So, yeah, forest among many other, yes, relevant datas. sequester one-third of the emission, forest hosts up to 80% of terrestrial biodiversity, and forests provide livelihoods to billions of people, including 1.8 billion people dependent on fuelwood for cooking and substance. So I think in order to achieve this climate goals, we need forests. And The Forest Resource Assessment 2025 indicate both progress and urgencies. Yeah, we have 4.14 billion hectares of forest, one-third of the Earth's surface, but still we are facing like continuous forest loss, 10.9 million hectares lost to deforestation every year, 41 million hectares, say, destroyed by pest and diseases, another 127 million hectares burned by fire every year. So in total, it's 180 million hectares either lost or degraded. So we're talking about 3% increase of forest cover by 2030. Without addressing this continuous forest loss and degradation, we can't achieve our ambitious goals. So this is the value of this roadmap. And the first global stocktake of the Paris Agreement provides a very clear message: Parties must enhance efforts to hold and reverse deforestation and forest degradation. And the COP30 Roadmap offers a vital opportunity to translate that mandate into concrete and coherent country-led action, grounding science and experiences. So deforestation persists not because of lack of solutions, but because of governance, incentives, and livelihoods are not aligned. So forest loss is driven by pressures largely beyond the forest sector. And people used to tell the story in a negative way. I used to say to my colleagues that we need to to change the narratives, to tell the story in a positive way. I think because, imagine that you are a farmer, the first thing you wake up and think about is, yeah, where's my food? Where's my breakfast and lunch? So if we don't have food, then you clear the forest to grow crops. I think this is reasonable. Yes, this is a right decision from the farmer. So we cannot blame the farmers. we need to take into consideration the livelihood need of the communities and forest dependent people. So governance, incentives, and systems should be aligned. So in our submission on the COP30 roadmap, I feel articulated seven semantic shifts. Firstly, strengthening land and forest governance. Secondly, scaling sustainable forest and agriculture production models. including agroforestry, restoration of degraded land, and sustainable value chains. As in many parts of the world, countries are implementing towards the right direction, and there are so many models that can be actually scaled up, including those that I witnessed in Brazil. I went to visit Brazil three times last year and talking about productive forests. say, productive restoration. I think those traits inspired me greatly. And yes, so thirdly, promoting responsible consumption and trade through traceability. And fourthly, create, say, incentives for standing forests. Fifthly, investing in data, monitoring, and transparency. Sixthly, improving rural livelihoods. And seventhly, It's addressing forest disturbances, so especially the wildfires, pests, and diseases. So we have global platform to address the issue of deforestation, especially through the UN REDD+ program. We are now building a global platform involving 120 now members to, say, implement integrated fire management. So including through these global fire hub. And then, say encouragingly, I think countries like Brazil have shown that deforestation can be slowed and reversed. And yeah, including, say, the number of COP30 presidency initiatives. So in conclusion, the challenge is not a lack of knowledge or tools, it is important. to implement at scale and with urgency. So I feel stands ready to work with UNFCA member states and COP30 presidencies in the process ahead of us. Thank you very much.

Thank you very much. I would like now to invite Ms. Midori Paxton, Nature Director, United Nations Development Programme. Thank you.

Thank you so much, Marco, and thank you so much for the kind invitation to this important event. From our side, UNDP warmly welcomes the COP30 Presidency's roadmap as a timely and action-oriented effort to translate the global stocktake outcomes on forests into real-world implementation. And this UNFF21 is an important opportunity to listen and align and strengthen coherence around this emerging roadmap. As the Secretary-General has reaffirmed, there is simply no 1.5 without tropical forests. And as we all know, forests are not only a climate solution. They are central to biodiversity protection, livelihoods, and sustainable development, particularly for indigenous peoples and other forest-dependent communities. And forests are everybody's business, and we are treating within UNDP as such. And unless we truly, unless they, the forest, truly become everybody's business, we won't be able to achieve our common goals. So what can take us to the next level in terms of forest action? And so halting and reversing Deforestation requires tackling underlining drivers through integrated policy, governance reform, and incentives at national and very importantly, sub-national levels. And we need to shift our value system. regarding forests and their critical role for humanity. We need to shift how finance flows and shift policy and practices. So UNDP is supporting countries across forest regions to cause these three shifts and linking forest conservation, restoration, and sustainable livelihoods. advancing nature-based solutions, including support to high integrity carbon markets, and promoting sustainable bioeconomy approaches that deliver also development benefits. And scaled and predictable finance is essential. In this regard, UNDP works with partners to help countries access climate, nature, and development finance. and to better align carbon and non-carbon incentives. And UNDP is proud to have been a core partner of the UN REDD program since 2008. UN REDD's 2030 strategy, developed through an inclusive process, provides a strong platform to support implementation of this roadmap. And in turn, this roadmap offers a real opportunity to build synergies across existing initiatives, accelerate delivery, and support ambitions, country-driven actions, which is essential for our collective endeavor. After all, there is no prosperity, no sustainable development without healthy forests, without nature. and a healthy planet. So, ladies and gentlemen, please do count on us to be a formidable, committed partner to turn this roadmap into impact on the ground. Thank you.

Thank you very much. I would now like to invite Professor Juliano Assuncao He is the director of the Climate Policy Initiative, and he is working very closely with us in drafting the roadmap. So please, you have 10 minutes. Let's be attentive to time because we're starting to run a little bit late. Thank you.

Thank you, Marco Tullio. Well, first of all, I'd like to thank you for everyone for being here, for the opportunity to engage on this important work that is, as it was mentioned before, is quite timely. And I truly believe that we are in a very significant process, and I will encourage everyone to get closer to this effort that is so important. Please, next slide, please. Well, what you're talking here is an initiative to implement the Global Stocktake by translating its forest-related outcomes into coordinated, country-driven action that halt and reverse deforestation, forest degradation by 2030, right? So in essence, that's an effort that is pretty much about delivery and an ambition for implementation, in which we're going to consider major forest biomes and taking key actions and work on enabling conditions to improve how we are dealing with all of those ecosystems, right? And this process has been quite comprehensive, a multi-stakeholder, built on continuous engagement, consultation, and validation. And that has been primarily led by the COP30 presidency with the support of the Climate Policy Initiative as the secretariat. We are pretty much in the, I would say, from the point of view of the flow chart, we are in the middle, but I would say that we are more on the beginning of this interactive process in which we already did, as Marco Tullio mentioned before, a round of consultations through the UNFCCC. We got almost 200 contributions that we got quite positively surprised about the level, the depth. and how comprehensive was all of these contributions. And based on that, I think we were able to update the predetermined outline and to present here something that will structure, I think, the next phase of interactions, right? And I'd like to emphasize the importance of these interactions that we would like to emphasize from now on. And as you can see, you know, from, you know, the locations of our forest, we are not short on ambition, right? That's an effort that covers pretty much, you know, many regions of the world. It's a quite important endeavor, not only for what forest represents, but also in terms of the ambition, in terms of coordination and, you know, how many countries that are involved in all of these discussions. Right? When you think in terms of the outline of what we are trying to prepare in terms of the report that we're gonna anchor all those discussions, the report is gonna be organized in two parts. The first one is about why to engage in such a roadmap at this time. And here there are many reasons in order to do that, you know, primarily driven by physical, social, and economic risks. But we'd like to also point out means of implementation, right, and anchoring on the decisions around the global stocktake and what can be done by 2030 in two different levels, on a national level and international level. Moving to the next slide, once more, please. So in terms of part one, I think my previous, the previous contributions here, they show quite clearly, you know, how important it's to engage in halting and reversing deforestation, forest degradation now, because not only there are, you know, risks that are more on the physical side, but they have also quite significant social and economic consequences to all of us. And the roadmap, the first round of contributions, they were very, very clear on the importance of all of those dimensions and also the interaction among these different dimensions. So moving to part two, as I mentioned, we got many contributions in this initial phase. And one thing that became quite clear from this first round of contributions was the fact that we are ready to move to implementation. You know, we do have the tools, we know how to deal with most of the issues associated with the forest agenda. So a way of, you know, structuring all of those contributions in a kind of a working plan for us is to invite countries to prepare their own forest pathway, their own forest strategy. So the first, I think, you know, issue that we'd like to emphasize in the roadmap, especially looking at what can be done at a national basis, is to invite countries to think carefully about, you know, what we can do in terms of, you know, all of the forest challenges and the forest opportunities that are there. Right? So the roadmap will not prescribe a single model, but rather is going to invite countries to translate what is embedded in the global stocktake into forest roadmaps grounded on regional and national diagnosis, on priorities, measurable targets, existing policy tools, and additional steps needed to deliver results by 2030. So that's the invitation that we'd like to emphasize on this first piece, right? And in order to do that, we also have, from the initial round of contributions, a very significant view on how the different dimensions of the forest agenda has been playing, you know, across the different countries. And you can see that different countries face different challenges, you know, the importance of each one of those issues, they appear differently in different countries. So it's important to take into account that the forest challenge, you know, this roadmap should be flexible enough to accommodate the diversity that we observe across all these countries, but at the same time have a kind of a coherent proposition to halt and reverse deforestation, forest degradation by 2030. So the idea is to create, you know, to offer to countries in that exercise of setting up their national strategy, is to provide, you know, policy tools and initiatives and solutions that have been implemented in different parts of the world associated with the different forest dimensions that we are considering this effort. So the roadmap will be practical, based on countries' experiences, and it will help identify key challenges, understand the drivers that, as it was said before, they vary quite differently across the different countries. And it's going to be drawing on existing policy tools that we'd like to, through this moment onwards, we'd like to increase our ability to describe what's going on in different parts of the world across the different forest dimensions, and I think it will be a significant contribution for those countries who are engaging in developing their own national strategy, you know, to rely in other countries' experiences and examples and solutions. So we really believe that this is an effort in which we can provide significant contributions along the process, along the way, right? And then finally, the roadmap will have an international piece, because not only countries can develop their own plan, but I think it's critically important, and this was a message that came quite strongly from the process of the initial consultation that we got, is that there's a lot of room for international cooperation. And you can think the international cooperation across these three different work streams. The first one is about technical cooperation, capacity building, institutional strengthening. You know, as it was also mentioned here before, we are, you know, still short in some critical issues to deal with forest, you know, from monitoring systems you know, that are still a challenge. There are interesting solutions that, you know, some countries have developed, you know, over time that could be applied in other contexts as well. So creating a space, a forum in which those experiences, you know, and providing those tools for countries that are engaged in this process of designing their own roadmaps on forest, I think it will be quite important. The second work stream would be about financial solutions. As it was mentioned before, there are many financial mechanisms that are available. But most of the times, when you think about, they are not still fit for purpose. They're not fit for purpose in the sense that they are too fragmented. They are not in the scale that the issues present themselves. And there are still some missing gaps, you know? So taking the existing structures and building a fit for purpose architecture will be a second work stream here. And on our side, I think we have a very good starting point from existing structures and conversations that are around some of these key mechanisms. And the third pillar will be on international regulation and institutional improvements that we can incorporate. So this is pretty much what we have so far, and I'd like to thank you again for the opportunity to present here. It was a pleasure. Thank you.

Thanks a lot, Juliano. So now we resume the presentations by different countries, and we're delighted to invite Mr. Nicholas Nugroho Suryobasundro, Director of Mangrove Rehabilitation, Ministry of Forests of Indonesia.

Thank you.

You have the floor. Five minutes, please.

Thank you, Marco. Excellencies, esteemed speakers, and distinguished participants, good afternoon to you all. Let me start by commending COP 30 presidency on organizing this side event at the UNFF21. First of all, Ladies and gentlemen, Indonesia's forest ecosystem, including tropical rainforests, peatland, and mangrove forests, exemplify this interconnected environmental function. These ecosystems are among some of the world's richest carbon sinks, while also providing essential ecosystem services at both national and global levels. Halting and reversing deforestation and forest degradation are essential to achieving the objective of Paris Agreement in light of the outcomes of the first global stocktake, which highlighted the urgency of scaling up mitigation efforts across all sectors. Therefore, Indonesia welcomes the initiative of the COP30 presidency to develop a roadmap on halting and reversing deforestation and forest degradation by 2030. This initiative represents an important opportunity to accelerate implementation of global forest-related commitments and strengthen international cooperation to protect and sustainably manage forests. Indonesia emphasizes that halting and reversing deforestation and forest degradation requires integrated, systematic, and implementation-oriented approaches to address such underlying drivers as complex interaction between land use change, economy pressure, spatial planning challenges, and development needs, and also critical challenge which often associated with unsustainable logging practices, forest fires, and illegal activities, while ensuring sustainable development and community welfare. Therefore, Indonesia undertakes a range of policy measures implementation as solution to deforestation and forest degradation, including first, strengthening forest governance and legal certainty of forest area; second, implementing a permanent moratorium on new permits in primary forests and peatlands; third, improving land use planning and controlling forest conservation; fourth, promoting sustainable supply chains and legal legality assurance system, including timber legality verification. Fifth, strengthening law enforcement against illegal logging and forest-related crimes. Sixth, enhancing forest monitoring system and forest protection policies. Indonesia also strengthened its forest management approaches through improved forest and land fires monitoring and early warning systems. Enhance peatland management to reduce degradation risk, strengthen enforcement against illegal logging and forest degradation, and the last one is rehabilitation of degraded forest areas. Participant, ladies and gentlemen, Indonesia, as an archipelagic state and mega biodiverse country, has been working and tirelessly to advance development together with environment protection and restoration. Indonesia prioritizes forest restoration, reforestation, and afforestation as its efforts on climate mitigation, ecosystem resilience, disaster risk reduction, and sustainable livelihood, while supporting global efforts, restoration of degraded land, forest landscapes, peatland restoration through hydrological approach, mangrove rehabilitation to strengthen coastal resilience and carbon sequestration, reforestation effort to enhance biodiversity and ecosystem function. Ladies and gentlemen, distinguished participants, forests play a crucial role in global climate mitigation. as well as supporting livelihood, economic development, and social well-being. They also contribute to achieving multiple global goals, including the SDGs and the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. Recognizing this contribution, Indonesia has adopted an integrated national strategy through Indonesia's Forestry and Other Land Use, or FOLU, Net-Zero 2030. Our commitment to addressing climate change while taking into account our citizen welfare, the natural landscape, and the nation's global responsibilities under the UNFCCC is unwavering, as well as our strong commitment to mangrove restoration. Therefore, in this UNF21, Indonesia welcomes all UN member countries contribution to protect global mangrove and share it at a World Mangrove Center side event that will be convened on 13 May 2026. Thank you.

Thank you very much. We would like now to invite Professor Joseph Malasi from the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Thank you, Markku. And congratulations for organizing this very important meeting. I would also commend the presence of Madame Biao. Thank you so much for your. Dear Excellencies and distinguished delegates, allow me to begin my remarks with two timely African proverbs on forests. which goes, the first one, "We do not inherit forests from our ancestors, but we borrow them from our children." And the second, "The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago, and the second best time is right now." End of quote. These sayings from those who lived before us recall us of our responsibility to leave forest standing and their biodiversity, of course, healthy for future generations. For the Congo Basin, the climate crisis is a profound call into question of the state of conscious of our generation, one that knows almost everything about what it should do, yet fails to act accordingly. Excellencies, distinguished delegates, by the end of COP31 in November 2026, The roadmap we are trying to build together will only have around 1,500 days to deliver. Therefore, it is critical to be realistic and strategic to ensure its success is in such a very short time. Our contribution is declined in five key points. The first, the roadmap must be action-oriented, rather than a mere display of ambitions. We already have several of them gathering dust in our cupboards. Our forest doesn't live on big ambitions sleeping on papers, but on programs that are action-oriented on the ground. Second, the roadmap should include all types of forest and avoid to cure one while leaving sick the others. As far as possible, it should address our major three tropical forest basins in a synchronized and coordinated manner. Our forests form a single ecosystemic unit. Third, the roadmap should put local communities and indigenous people in the heart of its thinking and work with them to effectively address key deforestation drivers. In the Congo Basin, for instance, deforestation is not caused by vast industrial or infrastructure project, but rather by extreme poverty of local communities and indigenous people. In some countries, around three out of four of the population live with less than 2.2 US dollars a day. Women practice small-scale agriculture for survival and send children to school. Some regions depend for more than 80% on wood for fuel, for domestic reasons and business with urban areas. People practice artisanal and illegal logging, not by choice, but because of lack of socioeconomic alternatives. The roadmap will be confronted with these realities. Therefore, it should serve as a flagship mechanism designed to reinforce the many existing mechanisms across the region, rather than duplicating them, and never try to have competing objectives. Some of these initiatives over the years have gathered a wealth of experience on what to do and how to do, but lack sufficient resources to implement and put at scale some of their ideas. Fourth, the roadmap should seek to strengthen and scale up the payment for ecosystem services, an initiative supported by our government and the Central African Forest Initiative, CAFI, and soon supported by the Tropical Forest Forever Facility. This one will create effective and sustainable socioeconomic alternatives across the Congo Basin forest. and turn thousands of local communities and indigenous people into forest keepers rather than forest consumers. And last but not least, the roadmap should support countries in putting in place more policies and regulations aimed at protecting standing forests. It is critical to first protect and manage what we have, before we start restoring what we have already lost, in order to multiply our chances to stay within global climate targets. I thank you.

Thank you very much, Professor Malasse. I would now like to invite Mr. Keith Anderson, Senior Forest Policy Officer, Federal Office for the Environment of Switzerland.

Thank you, and good afternoon, colleagues. It's an honor to speak in representation of temperate and mountain forests. Temperate forests in the world are 16% of the world's forests. Mountain forests are a subgroup of particularly vulnerable forests. And in fact, the European continent is home to 25% of the world's forests, covering 1 billion hectares. So, our situation is not of forest loss. Our forests are fairly stable and even growing in area. Our situation is dire in terms of ecosystem degradation, severely severe impacts of climate change. This means more storms and more severe storms, increased drought, heat waves, forest fires. Bark beetle infestation. In fact, one hears so much about forest fires today. Actually, pests and diseases have a larger impact than even fires on the forest estate. Mountain forests, we face the problem of melting permafrost, which for climate is a game changer in terms of future emissions. Also, reduced snowpack, which is a problem for water storage that used to be part of the mountains would store the water that would then slowly go to the lower elevations for agriculture and for use in civilization, in settlements. In temperate forests, there's species shifts, beech and Spruce particularly are affected, and so this means a big change in forest structure. So forest disturbance is really about declining ecosystem services, and this is in the context of the European continent with very high population density, and this affects then both water and health very directly, and forests are 45% of Europe's land mass. So, in Switzerland, Switzerland is actually not having oceans, we're affected doubly by climate change, and in fact are already at three degrees above pre-industrial levels. And so what we're seeing is a vegetation shift of 500 meters by 2100 for all Swiss vegetation, it's going to go higher up above the tree line and above the vegetation line of today. within the next 60 years, 60 to 70 years. Switzerland is also 50% protection forests, because only about a third of Switzerland is habitable, and the rest is protected, is protecting infrastructure and protecting communities. These are the most economically stable forests of Switzerland because when the communities that manage these forests are not breaking even economically, the government has to intervene. So, well, we received the roadmap first draft. from Brazil, and we also sent in a submission. But I would say for this region, for temperate and for mountain forests, for this case, some of the things in the submissions that were sent in also by Norway, by other European countries, by Switzerland, is the scope of all forests is in the general section, and that's very important. Also, being cognizant of the UN SPF and the FAO forestry roadmap to integrate this idea of a broader scope of all forests. And then the second section on tools, what I think from our analysis would be relevant to temperate forests would be to look at landscapes, ecosystems, nature, and also For this region that's so impacted by climate change, degradation is becoming and not becoming, it's already a very powerful issue in the Mediterranean with forest fires and heat, and it's moving northward. And so restoration, we think, is going to be a game changer possibility through this roadmap and hope to see elements on that, as well as what was already mentioned, SFM, agroforestry, and conservation. And so adaptive management is really the way that we prevent further degradation, and this is being built into every forest policy right now in the region. And further, also circular and sustainable bioeconomy approaches, i think, are also growing also in the UNFF. So finally, the third section on international cooperation. We hope this roadmap will reinforce the regional policy processes, such as UNECE, Forest Europe, FAO, European Forest Institute, the European Union with its regulations and programs as well. Also, as was already said, globally, implementation efforts such as REDD+, also UNFF, finally coming to UNFF. We really want to encourage here, and we already did on the floor today, that we send a positive signal as UNFF and as Member States to the development of this roadmap and to encourage the efforts and the initiative of the COP30 Presidency in Brazil, because we don't think you should be alone. And we think that many countries should also support this effort. And Switzerland pledges its ongoing support to the development of the roadmap. And I speak for our climate ambassador, Felix Werli, who you will see at the COP, and also for our DG Forests. We support the work that's going on and wish you good wind in your sails. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Now, moving higher in the latitude, I would like to invite Mr. Andrey Gribenikov, Director of the Department of State Policy and Regulation in the Field of Forest Resources, Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, Russian Federation. He will speak about boreal forests.

Yes. По данным ООН, на бореальные леса приходится 27% площади мировых лесов. Образуя пояс вокруг Северного полюса, они являются важной частью крупного наземного биома на Земле. Экологическое здоровье планеты и биоразнообразие северных биомов в значительной степени зависят от бореальных лесов.

No Russian interpretation into English available.

If the speaker would please speak in English, French, Spanish, or Portuguese.

Boreal biome is characterized by seasons, for which characteristic short, moist and moderate heat, warm summer and long, cold, dry winter. Flora is represented mainly by cold-resistant evergreen coniferous trees. Несмотря на ограниченный видовой состав, бореальные леса характеризуются богатым генетическим биоразнообразием древесных пород, что способствует формированию сопротивляемости к воздействию стрессовых факторов окружающей среды.

We ask the interpreter to please speak into the microphone. The microphone of the interpreter from Russian is.

Tree spices, which contributes to development of resilience to environmental stress factors.

200 million hectares, which constitutes almost half of the country's territory. In turn, this is 20% of all forests in the world.

The Russian Federation are predominantly boreal, taiga foresters. Russian foresters area is almost 1.2 billion hectares. accounting for almost half of the country's total land area. This, in turn, accounts for 20% of all forests in the world.

(Speaking in foreign language) Существенно увеличили средства, поступающие для развития лесной отрасли из федерального и регионального бюджетов. Стратегия социально-экономического развития с низким уровнем углеродных выбросов парниковых газов до 2050 года предусматривает сбалансированное снижение антропогенного воздействия на климат. которая включает максимальное использование поглощающей способности лесов вместе с сокращением выбросов.

In accordance with the decree of Russian President Vladimir Putin, forest conservation and restoration are a national development priority for our country. The development of the corresponding federal project has increased funding for forestry development from the federal and regional budgets. Russian's low greenhouse gas emissions social economy development strategy to 2050 envisions a balanced reduction in anthropogenic impact on climate, which includes maximizing the absorption capacity of forests while reducing emissions.

Законодательные и финансовые решения способствовали тому, что общая площадь восстановления лесов и лесоразведения увеличивается. Предпринимаемые усилия по восстановлению лесов и лесоразведению способствуют достижению Российской Федерацией глобальных целей по лесам, а также решений Декларации Глазго по лесам и землепользованию, подписанной Россией и 140 другими странами на площадке РКИК ООН. Кроме того, данные усилия являются вкладом Российской Федерации в реализацию десятилетия восстановления экосистем. Также планируем участие в глобальной работе по достижению целей десятилетия по лесовосстановлению и восстановлению лесов. Legislative and financial decisions have a.

Contribution to an increase in total area of forest restoration and afforestation. Since 2021, it has exceeded the area of forests loss. The ongoing efforts to restore and reforest forests contribute to the Russian Federation achievement of the global forest goals, as well as the decision of Glasgow Declaration on Forests and Land Management signed by Russia and 140 other countries and COP 26 of the UNFCCC. Furthermore, these efforts are the Russian Federation contribution to the implementation of the Decade on Ecosystem Restoration. We also plan to participate in global efforts to achieve the goals of the Decade on Afforestation and Restoration. As you, dear colleagues, know, both decades were endorsed by the UN General Assembly.

Большое внимание уделяется мониторингу и предупреждению возникновения огня, а также возникновению вспышек размножения вредных организмов. Таким образом, применяемый комплексный подход охраны лесов от огня, следуя решениям, принятых ФАО по развитию глобальной лесопожарной платформы, а также призыву к действиям в области комплексного управления пожарами, который был одобрен Россией и другими странами на АРКИК ООН в Бразилии в 2025 году.

Thus, we are implementing a comprehensive approach to forest fire protection, following the decision adopted by the FAO on the development of the Global Fire Hub, as well as the call to action on integrated fire management and wildfire resilience, which was endorsed by Russia and other countries at COP 30 in Brazil in 2025.

В этой связи хотел бы подчеркнуть, Россия вносит значительный вклад в международные природоохранные усилия, настроенные на продолжение конструктивного сотрудничества на взаимовыгодных и прозрачных условиях. Перед Россией, как и любой страной, стоит задача удерживать баланс между экономическим развитием и экологической ответственностью. Безусловно, решение глобальных экологических вызовов требует совместных мер. Благодарю.

I would like to emphasize, Russia makes a significant contribution to international environmental efforts. We are committed to continuing constructive cooperation on mutually beneficial and transparent terms. Russia, like any country, faces the challenges of maintaining a balance between economic development and environmental responsibility. Clearly, addressing global environmental challenges requires joint efforts. Thank you for the opportunity to discuss them today. Thank you for your attention.

Thank you very much. I now have the honour to invite the Permanent Representative of Guyana, Ambassador Caroline Rodrigues. The floor is yours, please, five minutes.

Distinguished Chair and colleagues, Guyana commends the leadership of Brazil and the COP30 Presidency on advancing the forest agenda at a time when the world needs practical implementation. Guyana's position has been clear for many years. If the world wants forests to remain standing, those forests must generate real and sustained value for the people and countries that protect them. Yet even now, too often, the global economy still rewards activities that remove forests more than activities that sustain them. Agriculture, mining, and land conversion generate immediate economic returns. Meanwhile, the global climate services and ecosystem services provided by standing forests remain undervalued and underfinanced. This imbalance is one of the biggest barriers to achieving the 2030 goal of halting and reversing forest loss, and consequently, the goals of the Paris Agreement. Guyana believes that the international community must support a menu of complementary forest finance options. In this regard, we strongly support the FCLP Forest Finance Roadmap developed with Brazil, UNEP and partners. The six financing pathways in the roadmap is capable of mobilizing approximately $68 billion annually to help close the forest finance gap. Guyana believes that two of these options must immediately receive strong international support. high-integrity jurisdictional REDD+ carbon markets, including R3s, and two, the Tropical Forest Forever Facility. Guyana strongly supports the rapid capitalization and operationalization of the TFFF. It can become a transformative mechanism to deliver predictable, long-term finance at scale. The international community has spent many years building REDD+ and jurisdictional carbon markets. They are now starting to work. As such, alongside building the TFFF, work on markets must be supported, not destabilized. The two mechanisms are complementary, not competing. Jurisdictional REDD+ links finance to measure climate outcomes. while the TFFF seeks to create long-term value for standing forests. Both approaches can support countries with different forest and deforestation profiles, including countries with historically low deforestation rates achieved through sustainable forest management. Ghana's own experience has demonstrated this. When we launched our Low Carbon Development Strategy in 2008, The idea that a forest country could build development around valuing ecosystem services was widely viewed as experimental. Today, it is delivering measurable results. Guyana has maintained one of the world's lowest deforestation rates, while building national systems aligned with the UNFCCC REDD+ framework, including with partners such as Norway. Forest protection is not about locking forests away. but about sustainable management that supports livelihoods while maintaining ecosystem integrity. Building on this foundation, Ghana became the first country to issue jurisdictional carbon credits under the R3 standard. Those credits are now eligible under CORSIA, the international aviation compliance market. To date, Ghana has secured transactions approaching $1 billion by 2030. and has already received about $400 million in revenues. These revenues are invested into national priorities identified through consultation under our Low Carbon Development Strategy. A minimum of 15% of these revenues is guaranteed for direct transfer to bank accounts of Indigenous communities, with more than 25% delivered in practice. Indigenous communities across Guyana are implementing more than 3,000 community-designed and led projects. Nationally, these revenues are supporting one of the largest climate adaptation initiatives. The investment in drainage and water management are opening up approximately 100,000 hectares of non-forested land, creating new economic opportunities to benefit thousands of people and strengthening food security for Guyana and the wider Caribbean region. We believe people must see tangible benefits, and countries must have confidence that long-term sustainable forest stewardship is economically viable. We are playing our part. Colleagues, Chair, the international community must be reminded that it has taken almost 20 years to build the systems and market architecture that exist today. Stable markets are essential, and this requires active support for operational mechanisms such as CORSIA. Instability or uncertainty can slow climate progress at precisely the wrong moment. This is why Ghana urges strong international support for both the Tropical Forest Forever Facility and jurisdictional REDD+ market systems as a matter of urgency. As we advance this agenda, Ghana stands ready to continue working closely with Brazil, the COP30 Presidency, the FCLP, and other partners on the roadmap to turn ambition into delivery. I thank you.

Thank you very much, Goiana. So we have time for only two questions. Was there anybody in the room on the floor? Yes, I see two hands raised there. Ladies first. Yeah. Please introduce yourself.

Okay. Thank you, Marco Tulio. I'm Ludmila Hatzes. I'm a scientist at the Woodwell Climate Research Center and IPAM Amazonia. So Mr. Krause, brought many numbers, mostly related with the losses of benefits provided by forest. But those benefits are mostly non-carbon benefits. And my question could be to any of you, but there's no money enough to pay, to compensate for deforestation avoidance. We need to bring those numbers into financial, fiscal, and the planning systems, especially the agriculture and the energy sector. Do we have a pathway to do that? This is my first question, and another one is, Mr. Anderson brought many things about the permafrost thawing, and permafrost thawing is probably one of the most urgent problems that we need to solve. So it seems that the roadmap needs to have arms and legs, like legs to step on non-forest places, and also arms to deal with the energy sector, because many of the alternatives designed by the energy sector is stepping on forests. So how the roadmap to halt and reverse deforestation is going to deal with these connections with the energy sector and also to non-forest ecosystems? And maybe this question is for Marco Túlio or Juliano, I don't know.

Thank you. Gentlemen, please.

Thank you very much. My name is Peter Proove, Director for International Affairs at the World Council of Churches, which has been working for environmental protection for almost all of its 80 years of existence. But I think in this context, I can also claim to represent the Interfaith Rainforest Initiative, which works for the preservation of rainforest, standing rainforest in five countries with the largest repositories, as well as for indigenous people's rights. I, like Martin Krause, just recently returned from the Santa Marta conference on transitioning away from fossil fuels. I think all of us who attended found it a very encouraging, very positive initiative in an otherwise rather bleak and dispiriting landscape. My question is whether something similar, a similar sort of international conference is envisaged as part of the amplification of this roadmap, because I think it would be a great opportunity for gathering support for it. I also have a question to His Excellency, the representative of the Republic of Indonesia. I'd be grateful if he could say something further about the impact of Indonesia's strategic national development projects on standing rainforest, primary rainforest, especially in the Papuan provinces of Indonesia, which is essentially closed territory with very little international monitoring or access. Thank you.

Thank you very much. So I would like now to pass the floor for people to reply. I understand the first question was addressed to Mr. Martin Krause, please.

Thank you, Marco. Yes. Yeah, no, you're right. I mean, the numbers most probably that you were referring to, forest finance should by 2030 reach 300 billion US dollars, and we are at 84 at the moment. I don't have a specific roadmap within the roadmap on how to get there. But all I can say is public grant money is scarce, very scarce, and getting even scarcer. So that means we do need to leverage all types of finance if we want to get close to the number that we think is needed. And all sources of finance means the markets, we were talking about the markets, if they can contribute somehow. We have the REDD+ in place, and to a certain extent that can also contribute. We have domestic finance from a number of countries who have made commitments, taking money out of the public budgets. So all of that needs to be combined, sequenced, and brought together in a meaningful way if we want to get close to those numbers. But the roadmap of the presidency maybe is an opportunity to go one step further, deeper and to see how exactly, you know, can we create a finance roadmap within the roadmap? Thank you.

Yes, Midori Paxton would like to comment.

Your question reminded me that it's so important to not to segregate between climate and nature finance. Right, because we talk about climate finance related to forest here, but then there's a whole constituency, so to speak, about nature finance or biodiversity finance. And somehow those two camps need to come together to make sure that forests are financed effectively rather than segregating them, which seems to be happening now. And because for biodiversity finance, for example, we are supporting over 130 countries to develop national biodiversity finance plan. And there's no finance plan for biodiversity without financing for forest. And then we also part of, we're a founding partner for the task force on nature-related financial disclosures, which brought the private sector financiers and major corporations around nature finance start disclosing the impact on their finance and dependency of their businesses on nature. So somehow we need to really connect the whole forest discussion with what's happening out there, and that's something also we can try to bring our part of our contribution. Thank you.

Yes, I would like, I have a few words to say on the issue of Santa Marta and so on. I appreciate it. I think there are some significant, there are many similarities between the two initiatives of the roadmaps, the one on fossil fuels and this one, but there are also significant differences. Well, the similarities are that these are the most important challenges. Obviously, fossil in terms of emissions is about three times bigger than forests, but as was said here, we won't meet the Paris Agreement goals without forests, so we need it. And forests are much more than just carbon stocks and sinks, although they are also carbon stocks and sinks. But given the fact that these issues, they have differences, obvious technical differences, but also politically, the constituencies are quite different. The supportive actors and those who oppose it are very different. So there are limits to what we can do together or associate one thing with the other. Nobody took the initiative to host a conference like Santa Marta, but on the other hand, we have quite a lot of forest related events this year, this one being one, the first of them, but not the last. As I said, next month we'll be in Bonn for probably three meetings, at least two already confirmed. And this year, fortunately, we also have the two other Rio Convention COPs where we want to go. And we are taking synergy among the Rio Conventions very seriously. So we will discuss, I just said that forests are more than carbon stocks and sinks. So we will discuss forests very seriously in the UNCCD COP from the standpoint of forests as a very important tool for halting land degradation and hence contributing to the efforts of the desertification regime, and also regarding biodiversity. So we will have no shortage of occasions to continue this conversation, not a specific ad hoc conference like Santa Marta, but indeed quite a lot of places. And you are all invited to join us in these subsequent conversations. I understand there was a question addressed to the representative of Indonesia, if he would like to comment on something.

For the question. Yes, Papua is one province in Indonesia that still has very wide primary forest, and we have developed collaboration with several institutions to preserve that forest. One of the key efforts to sustain and protect forest ecosystem in Papua is through the implementation of the activity that's funded by German KfW. and especially for the mangrove forest. We are really concerned about the primary forest in Papua, also the mangrove that is very important to protect the forest within the shoreline. By enhancing the resilience of coastal ecosystems and supporting local communities, especially for the livelihood, are closely connected to mangrove resources. And also we develop community-based forest management, especially in Papua, so we can engage the local people to manage the forest. Yes, we still have so many challenges, but we believe that we can overcome these challenges. Thank you.

Thank you very much. I'm now honored to pass the floor to Ms. Juliet Bial, Director of the UNFF, United Nations Forum on Forests Secretariat, to deliver her closing remarks and thank her very much for staying all the way here with us.

Thank you very much, Marco. Good afternoon, everyone. Marco, since I have the chance to be here from the beginning, Allow me to share one comment before I read my closing remark. I hear really, and my comment will build on some of the statement here in the room. This initiative, the roadmap, is not new. If we take it as a new initiative and we continue to do business as usual, It will fail. Let us be honest. We are here in this room because we have not been able to stop deforestation. If we don't really do the right diagnostic, and we get into really organizing COP of Rio Convention and all of that while we know that the key drivers of deforestation are outside forest. When do we talk to those sectors? You go into the room at UNFF, we are in our bubble. It's for forester. We talk to each other, and the right audience does not even know. When the minister are reporting about how they are addressing deforestation, they have planted 10 billion trees. while agriculture has not been addressed. So that's the reason why, you know, if you hear us very well, when I was presenting the GFG report, countries are investing a lot in restoration, in planting trees, and yet the global forest areas is still declining. So I think the value added of this initiative will be really to identify the right audience to talk to so that the key drivers of deforestation will be addressed. Otherwise, we'll continue to just act on the symptoms. Just want to share that. And the last point is engagement with the private sector. In all statements, everywhere you will hear, we want to engage with the private sector. Honestly, have we been able to engage with the private sector? When the forest fire is becoming a global threat and the private sector is not seeing any more forests as an asset, how do we convince them? I just want to share those comments before I read what was written to me. So, excellencies, distinguished delegates, and dear colleagues. As we conclude this highly timely and important side event, I would like to sincerely thank all speakers and participants for your valuable contributions and rich exchange of views. Today's discussions have reaffirmed that forests are indispensable to climate stability, biodiversity conservation, sustainable development, and the livelihoods of millions of people. Halting deforestation is therefore not only an environmental imperative, but also an economic and social necessity. Today, we launched the Global Forest Goals report, which gave us a strong message. Progress is being made, but not at the speed or scale required. Two of the most important targets of halting deforestation and forest degradation and on increasing protected areas remain off track. Only seven of the 26 targets are assessed as broadly met, while 17 are assessed as partially achieved, reflecting widespread but insufficient progress. The initiative to develop the roadmap for halting and reversing deforestation and forest degradation by 2030 is therefore highly timely. This roadmap can provide an important opportunity to translate existing global commitment into accelerated practical action. I greatly appreciate the leadership of the COP 30 presidency in taking this important initiative. We also recognize Brazil's leadership in advancing the Tropical Forest Forever Facility, TFFF. I believe that the facility will become an instrumental, innovative financing mechanism to halt deforestation, address forest degradation, and conserve tropical forests worldwide through long-term performance-based finance for standing forests. As we approach 2030, this initiative can make an important contribution to accelerating action during the remaining years of this decade, while also helping to shape the future global forest agenda beyond 2030. The United Nations Forum on Forests stand ready to continue supporting cooperation, dialogue, and action to achieve our shared goal, a global forest goals. I thank Brazil, all partners, and all participants and wish you a productive continuation of UNFF21. I thank you very much. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Waw. I took note of your tough comments, and we will follow up on that with your team. Thank you very much. Thank you all very much. Very productive conversation. Let's continue. Thank you.