Towards a standardized system for the reporting of carbon benefits in sustainable land management projects.

Given the fact that human activities currently emit greenhouse gases (GHG) equivalent to over 50 billion tonnes of CO 2 /year and that approximately 30 percent come from land use and land-use change, natural resource management (NRM) and sustainable land management (SLM) activities could have a large role to play in climate change mitigation. The types of land management activities covered by such projects vary widely. These activities have different carbon (C) and GHG impacts. Reports of changes in C and GHG emissions for land management projects are required for a variety of reasons and vary depending on the purpose of the project. Land management projects can be divided into two categories: (i) those that are carried out specifically for climate change mitigation; and (ii) those that are not, but still have some impact on GHG flux and require some level of C reporting. Mitigation projects are usually required to use inventory methods accepted by a certification scheme or other regulating body. As the interest in climate change mitigation has grown, so has the interest in reporting C changes and GHG mitigation for projects that are primarily SLM projects rather than C mitigation projects. For these types of projects, C reporting will be different, depending on the resources available and the motivation for doing the report. The Global Environment Facility (GEF) provides incremental financing to a wide range of SLM activities to ensure they can deliver global environmental benefits. These activities take place in developing countries and range from reforestation and agroforestry projects, to projects that protect wetlands

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