The Lowering Emissions by Accelerating Forest finance (LEAF) Coalition aims to mobilize at least $1 billion in financing, kicking off what is expected to become one of the largest ever public-private efforts to protect tropical forests, to the benefit of billions of people depending on them, and to support sustainable development.
Coordinated by
The LEAF Coalition received an overwhelming response to its initial Call for Proposals issued on April 22, 2021. LEAF received more than 30 proposals from jurisdictions which together encompass over half a billion hectares of forest, which is equivalent to an area larger than the European Union. This response clearly demonstrates the significant resolve in participating jurisdictions to increase ambition to halt deforestation.
Proposals were received from jurisdictions on four continents representing the world’s three great tropical forest regions including the Amazon basin, the Congo basin and forests of South-East Asia. Jurisdictions’ estimated self-reported volumes total more than 1 billion tonnes of Emissions Reductions over a five-year period, indicating the long-term potential of tropical forest protection around the globe. (For reference, the 2019 voluntary carbon market recorded transaction volume of at least 104 MtCO2e in 2019.)
In the near term, Emergent is working closely with participants of the LEAF Coalition to carefully review the proposals to identify those able to meet Call for Proposals’ rigorous selection criteria and ambitious timelines. Discussions with jurisdictions will take place over the next few months, with selections for this first Call for Proposals made by October and announced by the end of this year. For those jurisdictions not selected this year, this first Call for Proposals is just the start of what we expect will become a rapidly expanding market for high quality Emissions Reductions from jurisdictional forest and climate programs.
Emergent invites all corporate climate leaders to participate in the LEAF Coalition. LEAF welcomes participation by any company that meets its high-bar criteria of commitment to science-based emission reductions in their own value chains, backed by mid-century net-zero targets. For companies, LEAF provides an opportunity to accelerate their climate commitments through high-integrity tropical forest protection, while making history by joining the largest public-private effort ever assembled to end tropical deforestation. Please contact leafcompanies@emergentclimate.com to join a coalition of climate leaders.
Tropical forests around the world are under threat. The world lost more than 10 million hectares of primary tropical forest cover last year, an area roughly the size of Switzerland. Ending tropical and subtropical forest loss by 2030 is a crucial part of meeting global climate, biodiversity and sustainable development goals. Protecting tropical forests offers one of the biggest opportunities for climate action in the coming decade.
The LEAF Coalition can help reverse the trend by providing unprecedented financial support to tropical forest governments implementing forest protection, contributing to green and resilient growth through sustainable investments. The LEAF Coalition empowers tropical and subtropical forest countries to move more rapidly towards ending deforestation, while supporting them in achieving their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) under the Paris Agreement. Reductions in emissions are made across entire countries or large states and provinces (“jurisdictions”) through programs that involve all key stakeholders, including Indigenous peoples and local communities.
looking to participate in the Coalition, click here for the April 2021 Call for Proposals (including CFP submission template)
To read the LEAF Coalition’s September 21st participant update press release CLICK HERE
Read the LEAF Coalition’s July participant update here
Read the LEAF Coalition’s April 22nd multilingual launch press release here
Engaging tropical forest countries and states to reduce deforestation on a jurisdictional level and supporting their investments in sustainable development
Ensuring the full and effective participation of local and Indigenous peoples in line with the Cancun Safeguards
Private sector support is in addition to, not instead of, deep cuts in their own value chains in line with science-based emission reduction targets
Using the independent and rigorous ART/TREES standard to ensure uncompromising environmental and social integrity
Payments made by public and private sectors for demonstrated results that increase the speed and scale of forest protection
Catalysing private capital at scale, providing an avenue for companies to go beyond individual efforts to support global action
Jurisdictions reduce deforestation through national or sub-national scale forest protection programs
Transaction of ART credits from jurisdictions purchased or paid for via intermediary after diligence and internal approvals
ERs will transact at a minimum price of $10 per ER via intermediary, as applicable
Payments to jurisdictions
enable additional forest protection
and increased climate ambition.
Emission Reductions (ERs)
verified and issued by ART
Funds channelled to
jurisdictions according to fund
management best practice
The LEAF Coalition was launched on April 22nd by an initial group of governments and leading companies aiming to mobilize at least $1 billion in finance to support tropical and subtropical forest jurisdictions in making substantial reductions in their emissions from deforestation. This group of participants is growing, with new companies and governments able to join in the time leading up to the signing of final agreements by the end of 2021.
Emergent, a US non-profit, is providing a platform to facilitate the transactions to provide finance to these programs, and will serve as LEAF’s administrative coordinator.
Performance will be measured against the TREES standard. TREES is a high-integrity standard building on over a decade of progress in international support for reducing deforestation and ensuring social and environmental integrity. TREES is managed by ART, a voluntary global initiative hosted by Winrock International. ART also maintains the registry on which Emissions Reductions are issued, transferred and retired.
ART is governed by an independent Board of Directors, the members of which represent a diverse group of objective, globally recognized experts.
This first Call for Proposals is just the start of what we expect will become a rapidly expanding market for high quality ERs from jurisdictional forest and climate programs. Over the next few years, such a market could channel much greater volumes of finance to tropical and subtropical forest countries that take rapid action to halt emissions from deforestation.
The finance provided under this call for proposals will pay for high-quality Emissions Reductions generated during the 2022 – 2026 period, while allowing supplier countries to still use the underlying mitigation results towards ambitious NDCs (unless they elect to make a corresponding adjustment, which is not required under LEAF).
The LEAF Coalition will thus ensure that ambitious tropical and subtropical forest jurisdictions have access to large scale, predictable performance-based finance, enabling them to further invest in reduced deforestation and sustainable rural development.
ART will issue verified Emissions Reductions (called “TREES credits” under the TREES standard) to participating jurisdictions that reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation. Each of these represent one tonne of CO2e. The terms of these transactions are designed to accommodate voluntary purposes, such as voluntary corporate commitments to drive urgent climate action in addition to deep cuts in their own emissions in line with science-based emission reduction targets and aiming for carbon neutrality by 2050 or sooner.1
Companies are invited to participate in the LEAF Coalition by purchasing high-quality emissions reductions as part of broader voluntary commitments to global climate action. These emissions reductions must come in addition to, and not as a substitute for, deep cuts in own value chain emissions. LEAF thus welcomes participation by any company that meets its high-bar criteria of commitment to science-based emission reductions in their own value chains.
Yes. To participate, private sector buyers must meet four key criteria:
– Publicly commit to science-based targets (SBTi) or equivalent quantified and independently verified decarbonization targets, consistent with limiting warming in line with the long-term temperature goals of the Paris Agreement, with no or limited overshoot. In addition, private sector buyers should aim to have set SBTi or equivalent targets (as above) before taking title to ERs, and have the targets in place no later than 2023.2 Private sector buyers must also publicly commit to mid-century net zero targets covering all three emissions scopes.
– Join the UN Race to Zero.
– Publicly report a greenhouse gas emissions inventory following the Greenhouse Gas Protocol (GHGP).
– Separately report publicly any use of Emissions Reductions or other carbon credits, including purpose of use. Reporting should be independently audited.
This is a global call. All eligible national and subnational jurisdictions (one level down from national level jurisdiction), tropical and subtropical, which meet ART/TREES requirements for forest area are invited to submit proposals.3
Proposals will be selected based on their ability to meet the ART-TREES requirements, and the demonstrated credibility of jurisdictions’ ambition and readiness to reduce deforestation and generate ERs while ensuring the full and effective participation of relevant stakeholders — in particular, Indigenous Peoples and local communities.
Jurisdictions demonstrating political willingness to make or maintain durable policy changes that enhance ambition under the Paris Agreement would greatly strengthen their proposals. Proposals will be prioritized from jurisdictions with clear and credible pathways towards net zero emissions in line with the latest science, and have established, or have plans to establish as soon as possible, a 2050 Long Term Strategy to implement this global net zero goal.
Following the jurisdictional approach, progress is measured by looking at emissions from the forests of an entire country or state/ province. A reference level is set based on the average of historical emissions, updated every five years. Results are measured relative to this reference level, with deductions set aside for uncertainty and leakage risks as appropriate.4
Payments are made only after results have been fully verified by an accredited and independent body.
Deforestation is reduced using various public regulatory-, finance- and enforcement tools, in conjunction with other public and private initiatives, targeted at the root causes of deforestation, the features of which will depend on country circumstances.
Proposals will be selected based on the demonstrated credibility of jurisdictions’ ambition and readiness to reduce deforestation and generate emission reductions, while also ensuring the full and effective participation of relevant stakeholders — in particular, Indigenous Peoples and local communities. Through ART/TREES, Emissions Reductions achieved under the LEAF Coalition must satisfy and go beyond the Cancun safeguards, which require respect for the knowledge and rights of indigenous peoples and members of local communities, by taking into account relevant international obligations, national circumstances and laws.5 TREES requires third-party verification of conformance with the safeguards, and includes a series of detailed structural, process, and outcome indicators.
This is a results-based initiative. Payments are only made when emissions reductions have been verified in accordance with the independent ART/TREES standard, which embeds ambitious reference levels, strong requirements for managing uncertainty, leakage risks and permanence, as well as robust environmental and social safeguards.
The LEAF Coalition includes four transaction pathways: There is one pathway for Sovereign contributors to engage in transactions (#1), and three pathways for private sector buyers to do so (#2-4). In #1, Sovereign contributors will not use Emissions Reductions toward their NDCs. Payments support mitigation efforts in the supplier jurisdiction.. The underlying mitigation may be counted once: towards the Supplier Country’s NDC.
Private Sector buyers have three pathways:
2. Private sector buyers provide results-based payments without taking title to ERs.
3. Private sector buyers take title to ERs. Under this option the Supplier will transfer the ERs to the buyer on the ART registry. The supplier country may include the underlying mitigation in accounting for its NDC. The private sector buyer must transparently communicate that the underlying mitigation contributes to the Supplier country’s NDC implementation and achievement.
4. Private sector buyers take title to ERs for which the Supplier Country is willing to make a corresponding adjustment. Under this option the Supplier will transfer the ERs to the buyer on the ART registry, and the supplier country will apply corresponding adjustments for the underlying mitigation in accounting for its NDC.
For all pathways, the ART registry will clearly identify each issued ER for which the Supplier Country intends to or did carry out a corresponding adjustment for the underlying ERs in accounting for its NDC. In pathway 4, the application of a corresponding adjustment ensures the underlying mitigation is not double-counted.
Coalition participants transacting under pathway 3 should transparently communicate in public disclosures (e.g. corporate websites, annual sustainability reports) that the mitigation underlying units purchased through LEAF counts toward the Supplier Country’s NDC implementation and achievement.
These requirements – along with the buyer criteria detailed in the Call for Proposals document – will be ensured by the administrative coordinator through periodic checks. Should a corporate participant not make appropriate disclosures, the administrative coordinator will attempt to clarify the requirements with the participant. Following a notice period and a decision by LEAF Coalition participants, companies which continue to fail to disclose will not be able to continue to participate in the Coalition.
Standards and guidance bodies and the broader media and NGO community have a vital role to play in ensuring companies maintain their commitments. Beyond internal mechanisms, LEAF Coalition participants will look to broader civil society actors to further support accountability, and to bring any issues to the attention of the Coalition to support the process above.
