General

Sweden has during 2011-2014 funded Forest Peoples Programmes (FPP) through the contribution "REDD Financing, Human Rights and Economic Development for Sustainable Poverty Reduction of Forest Communities in the Democratic Republic of Congo". The effort has supplemented the national REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation) process, by funding activities that helped to support and strengthen the population by providing information about its rights, combined with investment and economic development activities and assistance to self-sufficiency. The initiative has been implemented in 300 communities, spread over the six provinces, Bas-Congo, Equatuer, Orientale, Bandundu, North and South Kivu. Sweden and FPP has now agreed to build on the last three years of cooperation and results, and to extend activities to include two additional provinces (Kasai Oriental and Kasai Occidental). FPP will interact with six local NGOs and 307 villages from each of the 13 REDD pilot areas in the DRC. The initiative has the following objectives: 1. To promote the application of strong REDD safeguards; strong VPA governance reforms, agreements and standards and to strengthen forest community land tenure, governance, regulation and laws. 2. To build the capacities of communities in REDD pilot areas and their support organisations and government institutions with regard to finance, gender, participatory mapping, project management and human rights, as well as the national REDD programme and pilots affecting them. 3. To support the establishment of community Monitoring, Verification and Reporting (MRV) systems, and to test and validate MRV on deforestation drivers linked to benefit sharing systems supporting REDD+. 4. To improve application of commodity chain safeguards by supporting the implementation of voluntary social and environmental certification and safeguards in commodity supply chains. 5. To promote dialogue, learning and collaboration in order to institutionalise the successes of Phase 1 outcomes into DRC’s national REDD strategy by sharing lessons; by extending outreach and communication with civil society and the government; by working directly with the Coordination Nationale-REDD (CN-REDD) on FPIC and by the development of benefit sharing mechanisms at the national level. The total budget for this contribution is 4.2 million Euros, approximately 39 million SEK, for the years 2014-2017.

Objectives

The overall objective of the intervention is to promote community customary land rights and livelihood security, economic development and sustainable poverty reduction in REDD pilot areas and key forest zones in the DRC, supporting protection for human rights and sustained investments in economic development activities with forest communities on the basis of their free, prior and informed consent, with specific focus on marginalized groups including indigenous peoples, women and youth.