E4.1.2. Incentives for conservation in the National REDD+ Program
The National REDD+ Action Program (NRAP, 2017) Principle 1.5 on maximising the benefits of forests and mobilising resources for their protection and management states that “The REDD+ Program contributes to progressively shifting priority to improving the quality of natural forest and plantations and reducing forest loss in order to maximise social, economic and environmental benefits; extracting more value from the environmental services from forests, and mobilising financial resources for the protection and sustainable development of forests”.
The NRAP includes a number of policies and measures (PaMs) related to assessing and enhancing environmental and social benefits, including promoting public participation in environmental and social impact assessments to improve land use decision-making; supporting farmers to develop sustainable agricultural models for key commodities; developing methods for calculating the Total Economic Value (TEV) of forests and including it in future land use decision making, among others. A few relevant PaMs are included below:
- Improving forest governance and livelihoods for people living near and in the forest, such as through supporting collaborative management of natural forests and employment and livelihood programs for people in hotspots of deforestation and forest degradation;
- Piloting, evaluating and replicating sustainable models for natural forests enhancement, protection and conservation, including cooperation between forest owners, local communities and the private sector on business models contributing to forest conservation (e.g. through non-timber forest products and other environmental services);
- Enhancing the economic and financial environment for forests, such as through ‘green’ investment and credit mechanisms for forest protection and development, developing and piloting economic valuation of forests with integration of forest values into national financial processes, and assessing the feasibility of a domestic carbon market.
Information under SIS B2.3 on benefit sharing is also relevant to this safeguard on incentives for conservation.
The NRAP (2017) also specifies activities to develop and implement financial management mechanisms for REDD+, including an appropriate incentive delivery system/benefit distribution system, involving assessment of current and potential incentive mechanisms for forest protection and development, issuing of a regulation on forest carbon rights, and finalisation of a REDD+ benefit distribution system, mainstreamed into Viet Nam's “forest incentives landscape”.