Assessing deforestation and forest degradation trends and associated current and historical direct drivers in the six CAFI partner countries

Expected impacts

An improved understanding of trends and drivers of deforestation and forest degradation will help to update knowledge and strengthen capacities to define visions and joint strategies for forests and livelihoods.      

Specific objectives     

The overall objective is to assess trends in deforestation and forest degradation and quantify current and historical direct drivers, using cloud computing solutions and free and open source tools for forest monitoring. More specifically, the project includes:

1. Developing a methodology to assess deforestation and forest degradation trends and direct drivers, with broad consensus among international, regional and national partners;
2. Producing and sharing a forest change map of Central Africa (2015-2020) that provides harmonised and updated regional information on forests and forest changes;
3. Identifying, quantifying and agreeing on current and historical direct drivers of deforestation and forest degradation in Central Africa;      
4. Developing a geospatial module in SEPAL (System for Earth Observation Data Access, Processing and Analysis for Land Monitoring) to inform land-use planning, and testing it in two pilot areas; 
5. Disseminating project results and lessons learned to enhance global knowledge, and defining the potential for scaling up worldwide. 

Results (as of 31 December 2022)

The programme started in September 2020 and was extended at cost in 2022. 

Results include : 

• Operational Technical and Steering Committees, with representatives for each national institution and non-governmental and inter-governmental body. Their meetings are entirely online. 
• A literature review and project library, regularly updated, including:
  • Definitions of forests, deforestation and forest degradation used by different CAFI partner countries, stakeholders and other studies and reports;
  • Current and historical direct drivers and underlying causes of deforestation and degradation in Central Africa that have so far been identified;
  • Existing global, regional and national approaches to assess deforestation and degradation trends and direct drivers.
• A designed, validated and piloted global methodology (available here) to assess forest cover change over time and associated direct drivers, which was based on a thorough review of existing studies, tools and initiatives focused on drivers at a regional and global level. The methodology is meant to be autonomous, robust, reproducible and statistically reliable, and regional data and methods have already been shared for use in other applications.
• A website (Storymap) with methods, webinars recordings and project outputs, data and interactive dashboards (for any difficulties accessing the site, please contact aurelie.shapiro@fao.org).

The website includes highly interactive sections allowing the user to explore the following: 

• Terms and definitions determined by the technical committee and applied throughout the workflow.
• A description of the robust methodology used to assess the trends of deforestation and forest degradation and associated direct drivers using satellite imagery and innovative analysis platforms.
• Regional Forest Cover: data for the land cover map, tree cover layer, forest mask and forest fragmentation map created for the baseline year (2015).
• Assessment of Forest Change: the forest change detection analysis from Landsat imagery over the 2015-2020 monitoring period included the processing of up to 1,222 Landsat observations per location, trends for which can be viewed using different data fragmentations.
• Direct Drivers: eight observable drivers were identified and studied, according to their visibility in high resolution satellite imagery from Planet provided through Norway's International Climate and Forests Initiative (NICFI)'s Satellite Data Programme.
• Results of Socio-Economic Surveys: the regional remote sensing assessment was complemented by local scale household and village surveys in two pilot landscapes in Cameroon and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, conducted by Rainforest Foundation UK. 
• Links to the permanent database and interactive bibliography: links to all source material are made available through the bibliography, and regional scale data produced by the project are downloadable in arcGIS Online.

Areas of intervention     

The assessment covers the six CAFI partner countries, i.e. Cameroon, the Central African, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon and the Republic of the Congo. 

Synergies

The assessment will inform the regular policy dialogue between CAFI and its partner countries. It seeks to supplement data produced at the national level that underpin Forest Emission Reference Levels, and the Nationally Determined Contributions submitted to the UNFCCC. 

Partnerships

Led by the FAO, the study convenes:

Six Ministries in CAFI partner countries: 

1. Cameroon: Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife (MINEFOF)   
2. Central African Republic: Ministère des Eaux, Forêts, Chasse et Pêche     
3. Democratic Republic of the Congo: Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development and Secretariat of the National REDD+ Fund
4. Equatorial Guinea: Ministerio de Agricultura, Ganadería, Bosques y Medio Ambiente (INDEFOR)
5. Gabon: Ministère des Eaux, des Forêts, de l’Environnement, Chargé du Plan Climat, des Objectifs de Développement Durable et du Plan d’Affectation des Terres     
6. Republic of the Congo: Ministère de l’Économie Forestière et du Développement Durable

Research centers and NGOs:

• Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European Commission
• Congo Basin Forest Partnership: Facilitation and Scientific and Academic College 
• Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR)
• French Agricultural Research Centre for International Development (CIRAD)
• French National Research Institute for Development (IRD)
• Central Africa Forest Observatory (OFAC), of COMIFAC
• Research network on the forests of central Africa - R2FAC
• Rainforest Foundation - United Kingdom
• SilvaCarbon
• US Forest Service
• World Resources Institute
• Wildlife Conservation Society