WRI Working Paper Released: Putting the Pieces Together for Good Governance of REDD+

Recently, the World Resources Institute, a global environmental think tank whose mission is “to move human society to live in ways that protect Earth’s environment and its capacity to provide for the needs and aspirations of current and future generations,” released a report authored by Lauren Goers Williams titled, Putting the Pieces Together for Good Governance of REDD+: An Analysis of 32 REDD+ Country Readiness Proposals (2013). The 20-page report available here discusses the following:

Executive Summary

Developing countries are receiving new financial and technical support to design and implement programs that reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (referred to as REDD+). Reducing emissions from forest cover change requires transparent, accountable, inclusive, and coordinated systems and institutions to govern REDD+ programs. Two multilateral initiatives— the World Bank-administered Forest Carbon Partnership Facility (FCPF) and the United Nations Collaborative Programme on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in developing countries (UN-REDD Programme)—are supporting REDD+ countries to become “ready” for REDD+ by preparing initial strategy proposals, developing institutions to manage REDD+ programs, and building capacity to implement REDD+ activities.
This paper reviews 32 REDD+ readiness proposals sub¬mitted to these initiatives to understand overall trends in how eight elements of readiness (referred to in this paper as readiness needs) are being understood and prioritized globally. Specifically, we assess whether the readiness proposals (i) identify the eight readiness needs as relevant for REDD+, (ii) discuss challenges and options for addressing each need, and (iii) identify next steps to be implemented in relation to each need. Our analysis found that the readiness proposals make important commit¬ments to developing effective, equitable, and well-governed REDD+ programs. However, in many of the proposals these general statements have not yet been translated into clear next steps.

Key Findings:

• Discussions of stakeholder participation, non-carbon monitoring, and cross-sectoral coordination are the strongest in terms of the number of readiness proposals that identify issues as relevant for REDD+, discuss key challenges and options, and propose clear next steps (e.g., studies, processes, institutional support costs).
• Few REDD+ countries consider specific design options or challenges related to REDD+ benefit sharing, conflict resolution, or revenue management systems, although most include plans to address these issues as readiness activities move forward.
• Relatively few readiness proposals identify specific next steps to address land tenure challenges or estab¬lish mechanisms to coordinate with local institutions during REDD+ planning and implementation.
• Cross-cutting issues such as vertical coordination of REDD+ programs and coherence of proposed new REDD+ bodies with existing forest sector institutions have not been explicitly considered in most readiness proposals to date.

Delivering on the commitments made in the readiness proposals will be crucial to building stakeholder confidence and scaling up financial support for REDD+ programs. We make three recommendations that can help countries make short-term progress on REDD+ objectives and ultimately develop effective and equitable REDD+ programs:

• REDD+ countries, donors, and civil society stakehold¬ers should consider gaps identified by our analysis and work to ensure that readiness activities promote comprehensive and integrated approaches to designing REDD+ strategies, systems, and institutions.
• REDD+ countries should improve efforts to prioritize and sequence readiness activities to enhance transpar¬ency on how readiness financing is allocated to differ¬ent readiness needs.
• REDD+ countries should develop transparent and ac¬countable domestic systems for tracking progress on readiness activities to ensure that readiness proposal commitments to well-governed REDD+ programs are carried out in practice.

WRI Working Paper Released: Striking the Balance: Ownership and Accountability in Social and Environmental Safeguards

Recently, the World Resources Institute, a global environmental think tank whose mission is “to move human society to live in ways that protect Earth’s environment and its capacity to provide for the needs and aspirations of current and future generations,” released a report authored by Gaia Larsen and Athena Ballesteros titled, Striking the Balance: Ownership and Accountability in Social and Environmental Safeguards (2013). The 28-page report available here discusses the following:

Executive Summary

Many governments around the world have put in place systems to help ensure that investments in changes such as infrastructure projects, government programs or new national laws do not bring undue harm to their citizens or environment. The effectiveness of these systems in successfully preventing negative impacts varies widely. Developing countries tend to have a particularly difficult time ensuring that investments within their borders meet minimum social and environmental standards. As a result, many financial institutions have established their own policies to help ensure that their investments do not result in harm to vulnerable communities or ecosystems. These policies are generally known as “safeguards.” Although safeguard policies provide vital protection against risks to people and the environment, properly designing and implementing these policies means navigating complex relationships between financial institutions, governments, and the citizens of recipient countries.

The World Bank (the Bank) has been at the forefront among multilateral development banks in developing safeguard policies. In recent decades, the Bank has experimented with different approaches to social and environmental protection. These approaches respond in part to variations in the way in which countries receive money from the Bank, such as investments in projects versus policies. They have also emerged in reaction to the changing global landscape. Some developing countries have become richer and created stronger systems to protect people and the environment. The global community has also realized the value of letting developing countries define their own development path. At the same time, the pressing need to protect our global common goods and most vulnerable communities has become more apparent.

This working paper seeks to help the Bank and other financial institutions take stock of experiences to date and distill lessons for the future. We look at four different approaches to protecting against social and environmental harm: the traditional safeguards approach, which applies to most project lending; the Use of Country Systems approach, which the Bank has applied to some project lending on a pilot basis; the approach used for Program for Results investments, which applies to the Bank’s results-based lending pilot; and the approach used for Development Policy Loans, which applies to loans that support changes to policies and institutions.

While all four of these approaches rely on the rules and institutions of the recipient country, they do so to different degrees. Through an analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of each of approach, we arrive at seven lessons for the World Bank and other financial institutions looking to balance ownership and accountabil¬ity in their social and environmental policies:

1. Building on country safeguard systems can enhance ownership and incentives for safeguard implementation.
2. Minimum standards and positive incentives can clarify requirements and encourage countries to strive toward more ambitious social and environmental goals.
3. Safeguard implementation requires anticipating risks, planning to deal with those risks, managing and monitoring implementation, and responding to harm.
4. Proper safeguard implementation requires people on the ground to engage, collaborate and problem solve.
5. Recipient country safeguard systems still need support.
6. Citizens play a key role in any effective safeguard system.
7. To successfully balance ownership and accountability, safeguard approaches need to recognize differences among countries, sectors, and projects. 

WRI Working Paper Released: Striking the Balance: Ownership and Accountability in Social and Environmental Safeguards

Recently, the World Resources Institute, a global environmental think tank whose mission is “to move human society to live in ways that protect Earth’s environment and its capacity to provide for the needs and aspirations of current and future generations,” released a report authored by Gaia Larsen and Athena Ballesteros titled, Striking the Balance: Ownership and Accountability in Social and Environmental Safeguards (2013). The 28-page report available here discusses the following:

[m]any governments around the world have put in place systems to help ensure that investments in changes such as infrastructure projects, government programs or new national laws do not bring undue harm to their citizens or environment. The effectiveness of these systems in successfully preventing negative impacts varies widely. Developing countries tend to have a particularly difficult time ensuring that investments within their borders meet minimum social and environmental standards. As a result, many financial institutions have established their own policies to help ensure that their investments do not result in harm to vulnerable communities or ecosystems. These policies are generally known as “safeguards.” Although safeguard policies provide vital protection against risks to people and the environment, properly designing and implementing these policies means navigating complex relationships between financial institutions, governments, and the citizens of recipient countries.

WRI Working Paper Released: Clearing the Air: Reducing Upstream Greenhouse Gas Emissions from U.S. Natural Gas Systems

Recently, the World Resources Institute, a global environmental think tank whose mission is “to move human society to live in ways that protect Earth’s environment and its capacity to provide for the needs and aspirations of current and future generations,” released a report authored by James Bradbury titled, Clearing the Air: Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions from U.S. Natural Gas Systems (2013). The 60-page report available here discusses the following:

Natural gas production in the United States has increased rapidly in recent years, growing by 23 percent from 2007 to 2012. This development has significantly changed projections of the future energy mix in the U.S. Advances combining horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing have enabled producers to access vast supplies of natural gas deposits in shale rock formations. This shale gas phenomenon has helped to reduce energy prices, directly and indirectly supporting growth for many sectors of the U.S. economy, including manufacturing.

This paper seeks to clarify what is known about methane emissions from the natural gas sector, what progress has been made to reduce those emissions, and what more can be done. Box S-1 lists the paper’s key findings. Box S-2 describes the scope of this study.  
Shale gas development has triggered divisive debates over the near- and long-term environmental implications of developing and using these resources, including concerns over air quality, water resources, and community impacts. One point of controversy concerns the climate change implications of shale gas development, in part due to uncertainty about emissions of methane, a potent greenhouse gas (GHG) that is the primary component of natural gas. Fugitive methane emissions reduce the net climate benefits of using lower-carbon natural gas as a substitute for coal and oil for electricity generation and transportation, respectively.

WRI Working Paper Released: A Critical Decade for Climate Policy: Tools and Initiatives to Track Our Progress

This month, the World Resources Institute, a global environmental think tank whose mission is “to move human society to live in ways that protect Earth’s environment and its capacity to provide for the needs and aspirations of current and future generations,” recently released a report authored by Taryn Fransen with Casey Cronin titled, A Critical Decade for Climate Policy: Tools and Initiatives to Track Our Progress (2013). The 24-page report available here discusses how,

[t]he last five years have seen both broad and deep advancements in national policies to mitigate future greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The next five years will be instrumental in ensuring that these policies are implemented effectively, creating sustained change that will achieve gigatonne-scale GHG reductions, and laying the foundation for countries to move ahead with ever more ambitious approaches to reduce GHG emissions and limit the dangers and costs of a changing climate.

In order to support effective development and implementation of climate policies, a suite of policy tracking tools and initiatives is evolving, with a variety of characteristics tuned to address different questions and audiences. Underlying these efforts is the observation of metrics related to climate policy development, adoption, implementation, and/or effect. These initiatives seek to complement the measurement, reporting, and verification (MRV) processes under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), promoting accountability for governments to set and meet ambitious yet feasible goals and targets, identifying barriers and facilitating course corrections when necessary, and ultimately supporting overall policy progress and effectiveness.
. . .

Spotlight: World Resources Institute

By, Kimberly Pierce Cortes, J.D. Candidate 2014, Pace Law School

The World Resources Institute (WRI) is a global environmental think tank whose mission is “to move human society to live in ways that protect Earth’s environment and its capacity to provide for the needs and aspirations of current and future generations.” WRI focuses its work on four key program areas: 1) climate, energy, and transport, 2) governance and access, 3) markets and enterprise, and 4) people and ecosystems.

WRI is a prolific publisher—ten new publications in December 2012 alone—with data and other relevant information for each of its program areas. This information is accessible via the publications page. The archive dates back to 1984 and includes 608 entries. There is no advanced search feature, but the search engine can be narrowed by topic. Although not especially sophisticated, the search engine does turn up relevant publications as well as relevant excerpts available directly on the website with links to the larger report. For an example, see this excerpt on nuclear energy in the United States, part of a larger report on energy options in the U.S. For publications not available online, WRI will ship print copies for a small fee to cover the cost of printing and shipping.

In addition to publications, WRI provides access to data sets and charts and maps. Data sets include U.S. state level data and global data on greenhouse gas emissions, along with more specific information on ecosystems both globally and for select countries. The charts and maps feature is very similar to the publications search, allowing you to narrow by topic and search across all WRI info-graphics.

U.S. Climate Action in 2009–2010 -- WRI Fact Sheet

This World Resoucres Institute report finds that while federal climate change legislation has stalled, federal agencies, states, and Congress made some progress on controlling greenhouse gas emissions in the past two years.

Eutrophication: Sources and Drivers of Nutrient Pollution

This Report from the World Resources Institute dated June 2009 argues that nutrient over-enrichment of freshwater and coastal ecosystems, or eutrophication, is a rapidly growing environmental crisis.

Worldwide, the number of coastal areas impacted by eutrophication stands at over 500. In coastal areas, occurrences of dead zones, which are caused by eutrophic conditions, have increased from 10 documented cases in 1960 to 405 documented cases in 2008. In addition, many of the world’s freshwater lakes, streams, and reservoirs suffer from eutrophication; in the United States, eutrophication is thought to be the primary cause of freshwater impairment. Many of our largest freshwater lakes are entrophic, including Lake Erie (United States), Lake Victoria (Tanzania/Uganda/Kenya), and Tai Lake (China).

The increase in eutrophication is the result of human activities. Major sources of nutrients to freshwater and coastal ecosystems include wastewater, agriculture, and atmospheric deposition of nitrogen from burning fossil fuels.