With the support of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) through the UN-REDD Programme, UNDP Seoul Policy Centre and the UNDP Country Office in Ethiopia, the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change embarked on a high level visit to Republic of Korea (1st to 9th March 2016) to share experience and design roadmap for the forest sector development program that can serve as a master plan for the coming 10 years. The visit created an opportunity to share knowledge and design a joint cooperation engagement framework between the two countries.
Ethiopia and Korea signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on June 26, 2016 extending over a period of five years. The MOU highlights defined areas of cooperation whereby South Korea commits to supporting Ethiopia in building the country’s institutional capacity in the forestry sector through:
- technical cooperation, training, research and technological support that will contribute to the implementation of the country’s overarching Climate Resilient Green Economy (CRGE) strategy;
- facilitation of exchanges of best practices and knowledge between the two countries for realising their common vision of green growth through large scale reforestation and sustainable forest management;
- designing a workable results-based finance systems and payments systems for emissions reduction under the CRGE/REDD+ strategy;
- supporting efforts in installing forest products standardisation and urban forestry through the introduction of technologies and urban forest management systems;
- encouraging investment promotion, and organisation of investor roundtables; and,
- supporting Ethiopia in their efforts to build the technical and technological capacity of the country to undertake spatial planning including land use planning.
The MOU is designed to provide a framework of cooperation and facilitate collaboration between Ethiopia and Korea, on climate change and forestry and hopes to contribute to the implementation of sustainable forest management in Korea and Ethiopia as well as the implementation of the CRGE strategy and the National REDD+ strategy in Ethiopia.
A fundamental aspect of the engagement between Ethiopia and Korea is to ensure appropriate mechanisms of cooperation are set-up especially related to approaches to capacity building, collecting, documenting and sharing experience at the policy and advocacy levels.
Ethiopia envisions building a climate resilient green economy through identified key economic sectors, including forestry that will play crucial roles in sustainable development. This seeks to put Ethiopia on the path of environmentally sustainable economic development while offsetting the potential impact of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated with the country’s ambitious growth plans by 2030.
The country considers REDD+, which is an important component of the CRGE strategy, as an opportunity and viable source of sustainable finance for investment in forest management, forest conservation, and forest restoration to enhance multiple benefits of forests. The national REDD+ programme is an integral part of the overall green economy strategy.
The UN-REDD Programme has provided targeted supported to the government of Ethiopia in order to enhance the national REDD+ readiness process, by strengthening capacities of national and regional authorities to understand the multiple values of forests, and to design a model for decentralised REDD+ under the UNFCCC Warsaw Framework including through policy advisory support and investment programming.
