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Global Witness found that logging operations in Papua New Guinea (PNG) frequently violate the Forestry Act, including logging in prohibited areas and ignoring landowner consent. Because China imports a vast majority of PNG's logs but lacks laws against importing illegal timber, its timber sector faces commercial and legal risks in markets like the US and EU. The report recommends that China implement mandatory due diligence for timber imports and that PNG establish a moratorium on new logging permits.

The report identifies Strategic Water Source Areas (SWSAs) as critical land areas that provide a disproportionate amount of surface water runoff or groundwater recharge, sustaining over 50% of South Africa's population and 64% of its economy. It establishes a management framework to mitigate impacts from forestry, agriculture, mining, and invasive alien plants, while providing guidelines for government planners to integrate SWSA maps into strategic development frameworks and zoning schemes.

The document argues that formal legal recognition of customary land tenure and the inclusion of local communities in decision-making are essential for protecting both forest ecosystems and the livelihoods of indigenous peoples. It identifies key legal barriers—such as complex registration processes and a lack of implementing legislation—that lead to risks of eviction, land disputes, and land scarcity. The factsheet advocates for the integration of Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) into national laws and provides a checklist of questions to guide law-makers through legal reform.

The WWF-Mondi Wetlands Programme (WWF-MWP), established in 1991, has spent 25 years catalysing wetland conservation in South Africa. The programme evolved from a local project in KwaZulu-Natal to a national initiative, and eventually part of a global partnership between WWF and Mondi. Key achievements include the development of a scientifically defensible wetland delineation method adopted by the forestry industry and government, the creation of the SUSFARMS® sustainable sugarcane management system, and the catalysing of the state-run Working for Wetlands programme. The programme has shifted its focus from specific wetland sites to a broader 'landscape approach' to water stewardship, engaging dairy, sugar, and forestry sectors to improve water security and ecosystem resilience.

The briefing identifies six critical challenges to connecting climate action and sustainable development: creating a unified national narrative, developing integrated planning and policies, ensuring institutional coherence, adopting a whole-of-society approach, reforming finance, and aligning monitoring and reporting systems. It emphasizes that because climate change impacts development and the sectors driving development are the same as those critical for mitigation, treating these agendas as separate risks undermining both. The document highlights examples of integrated strategies in Ethiopia, Colombia, France, Gabon, and Bangladesh, while calling for a shift from fragmented bureaucratic silos toward systemic transformation and inclusive governance.

The letter advocates for raising the EU's non-ETS emission reduction target from -30% to beyond -45% by 2030. It proposes that the starting point for the instrument be based on actual 2016-2018 emissions to avoid 850 million tons of CO2, and argues that carbon removals from land use and forestry (LULUCF) should supplement, rather than replace, emission reductions in existing sectors.

The document challenges the assumption that bioenergy is carbon-neutral, noting that LULUCF accounting cannot independently guarantee emission savings. It recommends an EU-wide cap on bioenergy, the exclusion of high-risk biomass sources, and a 'net-net' accounting approach for forest management emissions to ensure real climate benefits.

The policy brief examines the risks of including the LULUCF sector in the EU's 2030 climate framework, specifically the danger that carbon sinks could be used to reduce the decarbonization efforts of sectors like transport and manufacturing. It identifies four primary reasons why LULUCF is unfit for integration with other climate instruments: high data uncertainty (32% compared to 1% for fossil fuels), incomplete accounting methods that allow for over-crediting, the non-permanence of biological carbon stores, and the need for carbon removals to be additional to, rather than replacements for, emission reductions. The author highlights specific accounting flaws, such as 'Gross-net accounting' and 'forest management reference levels' (FMRL), which may allow Member States to generate unearned credits. Additionally, the brief criticizes the assumption of biomass carbon neutrality, noting that emissions from burning wood are often unaccounted for in the EU ETS or ESD. The document recommends that LULUCF be maintained in a separate pillar, that land-use offsets be prohibited, and that biomass sustainability criteria be strictly enforced.

The document details a workshop focused on transitioning Peru's National Adaptation Plan (NAP) from formulation to implementation. It identifies five priority sectors—water, agriculture, fisheries and aquaculture, forests, and health—and outlines the necessary institutional reforms, such as strengthening the National Water Authority (ANA) and integrating adaptation goals into sectoral planning instruments. The report emphasizes the need for a robust monitoring and evaluation (M&E) system, likely led by the Ministry of the Environment (MINAM), and maps out support from international cooperation agencies like GIZ, USAID, and the IDB.

The report examines how stakeholders in Swedish forestry perceive climate change risks and opportunities. It finds that while some anticipate increased growth, others fear storm damage and pests. Adaptation is driven by personal experience of extreme weather and trust in advisers, but hindered by distrust of climate science and conflicting views on effective management strategies. The document emphasizes the need for user-oriented, interactive communication between researchers and practitioners to foster adaptation.

The report examines 13 watershed investment programs in the U.S., focusing on how natural infrastructure—specifically forests—can be used to protect drinking water quality and quantity. It provides a framework for program development across three phases: building momentum, designing the program, and implementing the action plan. Key findings emphasize the importance of collaborative partnerships, scientifically informed planning, and diverse financing mechanisms, such as municipal bonds and water rate surcharges, to overcome barriers like insufficient funding and lack of outcome data.

The document outlines the risk-based due diligence framework required by the EU Timber Regulation (EUTR). It details a three-step process—information gathering, risk assessment, and risk mitigation—while emphasizing that the specific measures taken must be proportionate to the identified risks and situational context.

The document outlines the mandatory due diligence framework of the EUTR, which requires operators to collect information, assess the risk of illegal timber, and mitigate those risks. It argues that a risk-based approach is necessary because absolute certainty regarding timber legality is often unattainable due to information gaps and distance from harvesting sites. The guide emphasizes that while the legal framework is fixed, the specific measures an operator takes should be proportionate to the identified risk level, product complexity, and available information.

The report examines the applicability of the 169 Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) targets to Sweden's domestic context. Through a rapid screening and detailed interpretation of selected targets, the authors find that the majority of SDGs are relevant to Sweden, challenging the notion that they apply only to developing nations. The paper highlights significant gaps in areas such as youth unemployment, income inequality, and sustainable consumption. It argues that national implementation requires a political, government-led process to translate vague global targets into specific, measurable national goals, emphasizing the need for policy coherence and cross-sectoral coordination.

The Union of Concerned Scientists analyzed the second wave of INDCs for China, Canada, Ethiopia, and Morocco, focusing on agriculture, forestry, and other land use (AFOLU). The analysis reveals a disparity between developed and developing nations: Morocco and Ethiopia provided detailed, ambitious land-sector plans, while Canada and China showed significant gaps. Canada's submission lacked specific mitigation actions and excluded natural disturbances from accounting, while China failed to distinguish between new and existing programs and lacked a detailed accounting framework. Morocco's INDC was identified as the strongest, offering concrete actions and differentiating between unconditional and conditional goals.

A coalition of environmental organisations urges the European Commission to adopt 'Option 1' for the 2030 Climate and Energy Framework, which establishes a separate LULUCF pillar. They argue that including Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry (LULUCF) in the general 'at least 40 per cent' reduction target would dilute ambition by 3-7 percentage points. The authors call for the removal of fungibility between pillars, the use of base-period accounting instead of reference levels for forest management to expose bioenergy emissions, and the maintenance of agricultural non-CO2 emissions within a strengthened Effort Sharing Decision (ESD).

The report finds that illegalities are pervasive across DRC's industrial logging concessions, with every visited site between 2011 and 2014 showing violations. These range from over-harvesting and tax avoidance to human rights abuses and the use of fraudulent CITES permits. Despite laws like the EU Timber Regulation and the US Lacey Act, significant volumes of high-risk timber continue to flow to China, Europe, and the US, driven by weak government enforcement and a culture of impunity in the DRC.

Carbon Market Watch asserts that the EU's plan to link the EU ETS with the Swiss carbon market necessitates an increase in the EU's domestic reduction target beyond 40%, as the current target is intended to be achieved without international credits. The organization warns that a surplus of emission allowances, estimated to reach 2.6 GtCO2 by 2020, could dilute the 2030 target by 7%. Additionally, the document highlights risks from accounting tricks involving Member State surpluses and artificial gains in forest management, which could further weaken the target by 5% each.

The Ogiek Bio-Cultural Community Protocol (BCP) serves as a community-determined framework to protect the rights and traditional knowledge of the Ogiek, an indigenous hunter-gatherer group in Kenya. It documents their unique relationship with the Mau Forest Complex, detailing their eco-climatic zoning system, traditional medicinal knowledge, and sustainable honey-harvesting practices. The protocol outlines the challenges the community faces, including forced evictions, forest degradation from logging and charcoal burning, and cultural erosion. It establishes a community agreement based on national and international law, demanding Free Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) for development projects and equitable Access and Benefit Sharing (ABS) for the use of their resources. The document also defines a traditional governance structure led by a Council of Elders and proposes a land management system divided into biodiversity conservation, rehabilitation, and settlement zones.

The document maps the extensive legal landscape of international 'hard' and 'soft' law relevant to conservation, identifying over 30 categories of rights. It highlights a normative trend toward increasing recognition of Indigenous and local community rights within the CBD and IUCN frameworks, arguing that these standards must be distilled into accessible guides to prevent human rights violations, such as forced evictions, during the establishment of protected areas.