3d. REDD+ and climate change research at CIFOR

CIFOR has drawn on its ongoing research on REDD+, climate change adaptation and mitigation to equip a wide range of actors, including those involved in policy processes, with the necessary skills and knowledge to advance gender equality and women’s well-being through climate change action. CIFOR has capitalized on both its position as a knowledge hub on REDD+ as well as its partnership with IUCN and PROFOR through the Knowfor program to facilitate dialogue and collaborations among a wide range of organizations working to safeguard women’s rights and advance gender equality in the context of changing climate.

Knowledge products

In a soon to be published paper in a leading academic journal, CIFOR’s REDD+ researchers have traced the effects of REDD+ on gender equality at 16 REDD+ sites across Africa, Latin America and Asia. This large-scale research project finds that women’s subjective well-being has declined at REDD+ project sites, and attribute such a finding to gender being treated as an after-thought and inadequately mainstreamed throughout the REDD+ design and implementation process. The findings of the research were presented during the FLARE annual meeting in 2017, and to a Bangladeshi delegation from the Ministry of Finance and Ministry of Environment and Forest during a UNDP- and CIFOR-hosted knowledge-sharing event on gender and climate finance. CIFOR has also drawn on feminist and development literature to suggest several important lessons and considerations for building equitable and approaches to REDD+.

Responding to a formal request from the Ministry of Women’s Empowerment and Child Protection in Indonesia, CIFOR researchers have provided, through peer-reviewed publication, recommendations for integrating gender in REDD+ monitoring and evaluation indicators in Indonesia.

In response to a request from the Board of Green Climate Change Fund to review and assist in updating the Green Climate Fund’s Gender Policy and Action Plan, CIFOR researchers, through peer-reviewed publication, draw lessons from CIFOR’s research on gender and climate change to offer recommendations for the GCF.