The US Forest Service International Programme organized the workshop “South-South cooperation on the operationalization of the NFMS” from 9 to 11 July 2024 in Douala, Cameroon, to enable countries in the Congo Basin to share their experiences on the establishment and operationalization of their national forest monitoring systems (NFMSs).

Experts from Cameroon, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Gabon and the Republic of the Congo participated in the workshop with support from the Global Forest Observations Initiative (GFOI) as a part of its Country-Led Planning (CLP) initiative.

Key workshop insights

Maria Fernanda Jaramillo, GFOI CLP Knowledge Sharing and Learning Specialist, facilitated the sharing of collective conversations and progress within the framework of this learning exchange. Meanwhile, Ellie Peneva-Reed, Coordinator of the GFOI CLP, presented the CLP process and discussed the enabling conditions and limiting factors of its implementation.

The following key objectives were accomplished by workshop organizers:

• The status of setting up and operationalizing the NFMS based on the REDDCompass assessment was provided;
• Recommendations were formulated based on the aforenoted challenges to ensure the full operationalization of the system.
• The GFOI’s newest initiative, the CLP process, was introduced.
• The preparedness of the participating countries to implement the CLP was discussed (noting that the Democratic Republic of the Congo is already participating CLP country).

The GFOI's Country-Led Planning initiative

Country-Led Planning is the newest initiative of the GFOI, with an objective to help motivated countries identify a coherent sequence of steps to operationalize and sustain their NFMS and associated monitoring, reporting and verification (MRV) procedures as a core function of their government.

Impressive progress has been made in recent times from countries utilizing these systems to establish emission baselines and report results in their emission reduction efforts. The CLP initiative was developed to ensure this progress can be sustained with a concerted effort to embed these new capabilities within national institutions and apply them to a broader range of national needs (such as informing forest management decisions, policy development and ongoing climate action).