Please download the Proceedings of the Brazzaville Conference on «Monitoring Carbon Stocks and Fluxes” -  COMIFAC Workshop

For more details, view the workshop's documentation under the proceedings section

Brazzaville (Republic of Congo), February 2-4th, 2010 - At the initiative of the Executive Secretary of the COMIFAC with financial support from OFAC, OSFAC, UN FAO, WRI, WWF, START and JRC, a high level workshop was held on "Monitoring Carbon Stocks and Fluxes in the Congo Basin".

As a result of the inclusion of REDD in climate change treaty negotiations, the carbon Stocks and fluxes monitoring in the Congo Basin rainforests is the subject of more intense interest within the international community. This competitive advantage is therefore an opportunity to assess the status and capacity for rainforests monitoring and to identify the principal technical aspect associated with carbon monitoring in the region. In this framework, the workshop brought together international experts on reporting carbon stocks and fluxes in the tropical forests and Congo Basin' REDD practitioners. The Brazzaville workshop was an invaluable occasion to establish an intensive, and profitable exchange of information and know-how on REDD and moreover, to understand and capitalize how the projects inform technical issues of REDD preparedness.

The objectives were as follows to:

• Provide an overview of current land cover, land use and carbon monitoring activities in the Congo Basin, including both field based and remote sensing projects;

• Assess current capacities for land cover, land use and carbon monitoring at the regional and national levels;

• Establish scientific and technical guidelines for successful carbon monitoring in the Congo Basin;

• Identify current satellite data needs for Congo Basin land cover and carbon monitoring including data acquisition, data access and data dissemination, and develop a strategy to meet these needs;

• Identify a mechanism to inform COMIFAC and national governments on the technical issues associated with carbon monitoring, particularly in the context of REDD.

During three days characterized by many thematic communications in plenary, sessions of group workshops were organized around three main points namely: MRV systems for REDD; (2) Regional network for data dissemination and capacity building; and (3) Satellite data and reception station in the sub region. At the end of intensive work, participants adopted the synthesis and conclusions of the workshop. This fact confirmed that this workshop met the Congo Basin countries' need to build up capacities in order to continue their efforts on REDD and on future climate regime.

For more information, please contact: M. Carlos Dewasseige (cdewasseige@foraf.eu)

Participants at the Brazzaville COMIFAC workshop (Republic of Congo)

February 2-4th, 2010