Eq. Guinea, Cameroon & Congo share progress

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The 6th CAFI Executive Board meeting, held 27-28 April 2017, was an opportunity to exchange with government representatives of three countries (CAR was unable to participate due to connectivity issues) in the process of developing National REDD+ investment frameworks.

Topics for discussions included :

• Securing high-level leadership for the development of the NIF
• Ensuring effective inter- ministerial coordination
• Anchoring the NIF in national development and climate plans
• Coordinating with other initiatives, including the FIP 
• Ensuring inclusiveness and participation
• Linking with international commitments such as the New York Declaration on Forests, the Amsterdam Declaration towards eliminating deforestation from agricultural commodity chains with European countries', and the Marrakech Declaration on sustainable palm oil production in Africa. 

Amongts notable highlights were :

Equatorial Guinea, who has advanced most since the disbursement of the CAFI preparatory grant, is making genuine efforts to report on gender, having launched its engagement and gender strategy and already reporting on gender balance in meetings. Its communication efforts, with eight articles published on the FAO web site, were also noted. Project teams are fully recruited and intermediary milestones already reached for each outcome, which, in addition to the abovementionned on participation and engagement, include : 

- the selection of the 20041-2014 period for the historical period chosen for the quantitative anaylsis of drivers
- the validation of the definition of forests, deforestation and degradation
- 6 trainings on remote sensing
- the validation of the deforestation and degradation map (below)

Equatorial Guinea plans on presenting its National Investment Framework to the CAFi Executive Board  in April 2018. 

Cameroun, although the country is still to officially kick off activities under the grants provided through the World Bank and the French Development Agency, is expecting to finalize highlighting studies on drivers and strategic options by the end of may 2017. The country has initiated dialogues with the private sector, and is preparing a strategy for private sector engagement.

The Republic of Congo, also awaiting activities kick off, has initiated recruitment of consultants to undertake studies on the policy and regulatory frameworks, the analysis of REDD+ potential, the wood energy and agroforestry value chains, and an anaylsis of the potential socio-economic co-benefits.