Context
As Africa’s largest economy and second-highest emitter, Nigeria can play a significant role in achieving the Paris Agreement’s goals. The country’s updated commitments to the Paris Agreement, submitted to the UNFCCC on 30 July 2021, raise its ambition inclusively, demonstrating that it understands its role as a global and continental model. Building on this momentum, with support from 2050 Pathways, Nigeria has also developed a vision for 2050 that will form the basis for a Long-Term Low-Emission Development Strategy that captures deeper emission reductions further into the future.
In alignment with these objectives, the Paris Agreement (PA) calls for larger-scale strategies to achieve the Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) targets. Responding to this call, Nigeria has developed a new National REDD+_ Strategy -Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation and Enhancement of Carbon Stocks (REDD+) Strategy (2021) and a National Forest Policy (2020), including a National Forest Investment Plan (2019 -2023).
The objective of the National REDD+ Programme is to implement the forest sector plan for achieving Nigeria’s Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) aimed at reducing GHG emissions. The country intends to leverage the forest sector to meet the NDC targets of the Paris Agreement. This strategic approach necessitates accurately estimating and reporting emissions/removals from forests and their contribution to the Paris Agreement.
A key challenge for Nigeria in implementing REDD+ activities is a lack of comprehensive and up-to-date data on land use and land cover changes across time.
Goal
The requested technical assistance (TA) aims to support Nigeria in developing an accurate and comprehensive collection of activity data for REDD+ initiatives through creating and updating land cover mapping derived from satellite technologies.
CAA Technical Assistance
Without accurate data on forest cover and forest area, land use changes, and carbon stocks, it becomes challenging to quantify the emissions reductions achieved through REDD+ initiatives accurately and across time it will hinder Nigeria’s ability to develop a revised forest reference emission level (FREL), which serves as a baseline for measuring progress in reducing emissions from forest degradation and carbon stock enhancement and track progress towards achievement of its NDC. The TA also seeks to support the strengthening of effective governance structures and institutional frameworks essential for successfully implementing REDD+ activities. Therefore, addressing the data gaps through land use land cover mapping is crucial for strengthening Nigeria’s climate change governance capacity and building the capacity to monitor carbon stocks in the forestry and land use sector over time.
Nigeria has previously been supported under the LEAF (Lowering Emissions by Accelerating Forest Finance) Coalition, which links National Forest Monitoring Systems (NFMS) products with policy guidelines and emission reduction commitments. However, there are still data gaps in estimating and reporting land use areas and land cover changes to the required standard under LEAF Architecture for REDD+ Transactions. – The REDD+ Environmental Excellence Standard (ART – TREES) standard.
To address these significant data gaps, large-scale programs that reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, as part of the REDD+ process, are required to produce the high-integrity, high-quality carbon credits buyers demand for forest carbon markets and access to climate finance.
The proposed deployment will support Nigeria’s use of voluntary guidelines for mapping forest carbon under different forest carbon market initiatives in response to these needs. These forest carbon markets represent a significant evolution in the climate finance landscape, including the acceptance of Verified Carbon Standard’s Jurisdictional and Nested REDD+ and Carbon Offsetting.
Technical Assistance:
- Perform detailed LULC mapping for Nigeria’s total land area (ha) and calculate emissions for each REDD+ activity
- Development of accurate and comprehensive activity data for REDD+ initiatives through the development of land use and land cover mapping using satellite technologies
- Development of a revised FREL document and propose mitigation actions to reduce emissions and enhance carbon sinks/removals in the forest sector.
- Strengthening of Nigeria’s capacity for monitoring, reporting, and verifying emissions reductions from deforestation, forest degradation, and carbon stock enhancement
- Support effective establishment of governance structures and institutional frameworks essential for REDD+ implementation
- Facilitate stakeholder consultations with government agencies, NGOs, local communities, and the private sector
- Provide training programs and workshops to build technical expertise and institutional capacities for mapping, data analysis, and measuring emissions reductions
