Dissemination Workshop on Economics of Forest Restoration as Carbon Mitigation and Nature-based solutions in South Asia

About the workshop

The IPCC’s 6th Assessment Report  unequivocally states that anthropogenic activities have accelerated global warming at an unprecedented rate. As a result, the intensity and frequency of extreme weather events, such as heat waves, cyclones, intense precipitation, and droughts, have been rising, adversely affecting lives and livelihoods across the globe. Limiting human-induced global warming requires reducing cumulative emissions of CO₂ and other greenhouse gases. Forest restoration is expected to play a critical role in this effort. Evidence suggests that in low- and middle-income countries, up to 2 billion hectares of forest area could be biophysically suitable for restoration, though such efforts are not without economic and institutional challenges.

The South Asian Network for Development and Environmental Economics (SANDEE), a research capacity-building and academic leadership programme of the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) has been leading a multi-country research initiative to examine the economics of forest restoration as a carbon mitigation strategy and its distributional impacts on gender and marginalized groups in four South Asian countries – Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. These countries have been investing in forest restoration and conservation through initiatives such as the Social Forestry Programme in Bangladesh, Community Forestry and the promotion of trees outside forests in Nepal, the Billion Trees Tsunami Afforestation Programme in Pakistan, and the Farmers’ Woodlot (agroforestry) Programme in Sri Lanka.

Lead by Mani Nepal, Senior Programme Coordinator, SANDEE, our country partners are IUCN Bangladesh, Forest Action Nepal, the Sustainable Development Policy Institute (Pakistan), and the Institute of Policy Studies of Sri Lanka. The country research teams are supported by the SANDEE Secretariat and two technical experts/SANDEE faculty advisors: Jeff Vincent (Duke University) and François Libois (Paris School of Economics).

A final dissemination workshop will be held on 12 December in Nepal, bringing together researchers and policy communities from all four countries to discuss the research findings and their policy implications. This workshop is linked to the celebration of SANDEE’s 25 years of service in developing research capacity and academic leadership in the region, during which the three-day international conference “Development and Environmental Economics: SANDEE@25” from 12 to 14 December will also take place.

Detailed agenda