India is among the few countries worldwide to have achieved a positive trend in forest and tree cover. Nevertheless, 43 percent of Indian forests present serious levels of degradation. RECAP4NDC is a six-member consortium project which works together with State and National Government partners to tackle degradation drivers and promote holistic and climate sensitive restoration processes, primarily for the benefit of farmers and forest-dependent communities in India. The underlying approach is Forest Landscape Restoration (FLR), which entails reaching a balance between ecosystem health and human wellbeing in a changing climatic regime.
By 2029, RECAP4NDC’s consortium partners ─ International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) India, Forest Survey of India (FSI), The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education (ICFRE), International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) and GIZ ─ in collaboration with the State Forest Departments (SFD), aim to improve environmental and socioeconomic conditions across 0.4 million hectares in the three Indian states of Maharashtra, Gujarat, and Uttarakhand, as well as in the Delhi National Capital Region. To align actions with the UN Decade and contribute to the #GenerationRestoration movement, RECAP4NDC has joined forces with the GIZ DEER project, which supports the implementation of the UN Decade, to bring the Restoration Academy to Ahmedabad, India.
From August 21st to 23rd participants from the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Government of India (MoEF&CC), the SFDs of Gujarat, Maharashtra and Rajasthan as well as the RECAP4NDC consortium partners participated in the Restoration Academy workshop for peer advice, coaching and knowledge exchange.
On the first day, participants were introduced to the UN Decade and analysed and discussed FLR concepts. Speakers included representatives from the UN Decade Secretariat and the Society for Ecological Restoration India. They outlined the UN Decade’s vision and objectives, defining ecosystem restoration as a continuum—from reducing societal impacts to improving ecosystem management and fully recovering ecosystem functions. The Academy then focused on FLR, emphasising its integrated approach across entire landscapes involving multiple land uses, stakeholders, and governance systems. The UN Decade World Restoration Flagship “Restoring Mediterranean Forests” joined virtually to share their experiences with forest restoration after wildfires. The day ended with a site visit to the Nal Sarovar Bird Sanctuary near Ahmedabad. There, participants observed ongoing restoration and conservation efforts including habitat and wildlife management (primarily for migratory birds) and improvement of educational and sustainable recreational facilities.
Day two kicked-off with a focus on funding for ecosystem restoration. After an overview of the work done by the UN Decade Finance Task Force, the Applied Environmental Research Foundation (AERF) shared insights on linking value chain development with landscape scale restoration in the Western Ghats. This was followed by a session addressing the importance of rights-based approaches, with the NGO Women4Biodiversity highlighting gender-transformative strategies and the Indian Environmental Law Organization discussing how and which policies and laws can enable FLR in India. A subsequent Open Space session allowed participants to place topics on the agenda and discuss them with their peers.
The final day began with the question: How can we communicate the actions and impact of ecosystem restoration? LEAD Foundation, provided insights into their communication approaches to effectively disseminate FLR efforts in rural communities in Tanzania.
A subsequent session on monitoring presented various tools to help implementers track progress, including the UN Decade Monitoring Task Force's Framework for Ecosystem Restoration (FERM), IUCN’s Restoration Barometer, and the landscape selection methodology developed by RECAP4NDC along with the Insight Development Consulting Group (IDCG). The day concluded with micro trainings, allowing participants to choose between two options: a storytelling workshop or a step-by-step planning session for FLR approaches led by the World Resources Institute India.
The Restoration Academy India was jointly organised and hosted by the projects Support for the design and implementation of the United Nations Decade on Ecosystem Restoration (DEER) and Restore, Conserve and Protect Forest and Tree Cover for NDC Implementation in India (RECAP4NDC), which are both funded through the International Climate Initiative (IKI) of the German Federal Government and implemented by the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Nuclear Safety and Consumer Protection (BMUV).
Previous editions of the Restoration Academy have taken place in El Salvador, Rwanda, Nigeria and Tanzania.
All information on the content, session designs, and methods of the Restoration Academy will soon be available on the UN Decade webpage in an open-source format. UN Decade partners interested in using the materials to run their own Academy, can access the information there or contact [email protected] until the end of September 2024.
The UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration 2021-2030, led by the United Nations Environment Programme, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and its partners, covers terrestrial as well as coastal and marine ecosystems. As a global call to action, it will draw together political support, scientific research and financial muscle to massively scale up restoration. Find out how you can contribute to the UN Decade. Follow #GenerationRestoration.