NewGo!: sustainable finance and forests

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Background information  

As part of the NewGo! project (New ways for forest governance - Connecting science, policy and society), funded by the German Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture (BMEL), EFI will conduct two studies to analyse the relation of sustainable finance to forests and forestry in the EU and beyond. The main aim is to explore the potential and the implications of a transition towards sustainable finance for forests and forestry. 

The first study will focus on the different understandings of the topic s among key actors. Specifically, the study will explore how actors envision a transition towards sustainable finance, what concepts and approaches they are advancing, and what implications for forests and international forest policy they foresee.  The main approach of this study is a literature and document review combined with a series of stakeholder interviews from finance, public and private forest and conservation sectors. The empirical part of the study is going to be conducted in the second half of 2020. 

As a second step, we will analyse the EU taxonomy regulation and delegated act on climate change mitigation and adaptation with regards to the importance of forests therein. The EU taxonomy is part of the EU Action Plan on Financing Sustainable Growth put forward by the EU Commission in 2018. While an EU regulation has been adopted by the EU Parliament, the delegated act is still under preparation by EU COM and will be drafted once the Platform on Sustainable Finance - a newly established advisory body- is in operation.  

The study will explore the different positions of the involved actors and the process of defining the role of forests in the regulation, the reports of the Technical Expert Group (TEG) set up by EU COM and the drafted delegated act. The study builds upon a document analysis and stakeholder interviews conducted in Summer 2019 and will be further elaborated in 2021 to analyse the process progress.  

The results of both studies will be published as research papers. A short policy information brief will also be compiled targeting experts and policy makers that are interested in the topic.  

 

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