Project summary

Pacific rainforests in Vanuatu, Fiji and Papua New Guinea provide Indigenous landowners with food, clean water, traditional medicine, cultural identity and protection from extreme weather. The rainforest ecosystem is one of the most important defences against the impacts of climate change. But like many Indigenous communities around the world, customary landowners in the region are caught between protecting their valuable forests and earning money to survive.

Nature-based Solutions for Forests and People is working in collaboration with local communities to protect and restore critical forest ecosystems and build social, economic and climate resilience. Through the nature-based solution of sustainable forest carbon projects, this work is supporting healthy forests and biodiversity, and growing new income-generating opportunities that can benefit everyone within a community and grow the emerging high-integrity carbon market in the region.

A high-integrity approach to carbon projects ensures Indigenous landowners and community members receive an income for the time, labour and knowledge — both traditional and new — they invest in protecting and restoring a forest or any other ecosystem.

To achieve this, the Nature-based Solutions for Forests and People project is guided by the Nakau Methodology — a purpose-built Pacific rainforest conservation finance program that takes a strong approach to upholding land and carbon rights, and which follows a rigorous free, prior and informed consent process (FPIC). The approach brings financial benefits back into communities to ensure the project is long lasting and people are paid for their conservation efforts. Income generated from the project is reinvested in community projects, alternative livelihoods and contributes towards strengthened climate resilience.

This project is funded under Component 1 of Climate Resilient by Nature (CRxN), supporting the expansion of existing nature-based solutions approaches.

Our approach

Protecting and restoring critical ecosystems, including against threats like deforestation.

• A first-of-its-kind invasive species control approach to payment for ecosystem services projects under development in Vanuatu.

• Screening of 11 sites in Papua New Guinea is completed and will contribute towards a national-level project.

• One new project in development in Vanuatu, and two existing projects being expanded in Vanuatu and Fiji.

• Significant revisions to the Nakau Methodology have been undertaken to make it more user friendly, to incorporate lessons learned about site selection and to make it more inclusive.

Nature-based Solutions for Forest and People project site © Nakau.