Low-emission development strategies (LEDS): How can REDD+ contribute?

 Key messages

At national or subnational levels, low-emission development strategies (LEDS) are a key approach for planning and action towards integration of climate change mitigation and adaptation with development.REDD+ activities over the past decade have generated much information, institutional learning and on-the-ground experience that can provide valuable lessons for LEDS.In this brief, we examine two questions: What can be learned from REDD+ for LEDS? How can REDD+ be part of LEDS?REDD+ can be an essential part of LEDS in countries where forest-based carbon emissions are large. It will also be important where forest-based emissions are secondary. If countries chose to follow a socio-economic path based on low-emission development, REDD+ can focus on providing incentives for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, creating motivation for behavior change in forest management, and the incipient REDD+ monitoring, reporting and verification (MRV) and safeguard systems can be expanded with relatively low effort beyond the forestry sector.