How to help reforestation in North Korea

By Douglas L. McGuire

Deforestation and land degradation is a global problem, impacting the well-being of at least 3.2 billion people by accelerating climate change, loss of biodiversity and the reduction of goods and services of ecosystems.

The Global Partnership on Forest and Landscape Restoration (GPFLR) has determined through satellite image analysis of the world's deforested and degraded land that more than 2 billion hectares, an area larger than South America, have the potential for forest and landscape restoration (FLR).

To deal with this serious problem in comprehensive approaches, the Bonn Challenge was declared at a high-level meeting in Germany in 2011 and calls for the restoration of 150 million hectares of the world's deforested and degraded land, 15 times the size of South Korea, by 2020.

Today, that has been extended to 350 million hectares by 2030. Also, the Conference of Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity in 2010 in Nagoya agreed to Aichi Biodiversity Target 15, restoring 15 percent of the world's degraded ecosystems by 2020.

South Korea is often referred to by the international community as an excellent example of successful restoration and an inspiration for the rest of the world using a landscape approach because it has been recognized as the country that recovered its deforested land and "re-greened" a devastated environment in the shortest period in the world.

The Korea Forest Service has funded the implementation of the FAO's Forest and Landscape Restoration Mechanism (FLRM) since 2014 to achieve the goals of the Bonn Challenge by sharing its experience and knowledge of the success of the reforestation program in South Korea with developing countries around the world. Thus, the KFS is a founding partner of the FLRM at the FAO.

With South Korean and other donor support, the FAO has launched some global and regional initiatives and supported forest and landscape restoration projects in several countries throughout the world that have shown considerable progress.

At the global level, significant work has been done on sustainable financing for FLR as well as helping to monitor the results of restoration efforts. Support is provided to many global processes, including the U.N. Conventions on Climate Change, Biodiversity and Combat Desertification. Awareness raising and resource mobilization efforts have paid off.

At the regional level, the FAO is very involved in restoration processes such as AFR100 in Africa, restoring 100 million hectares by 2030; the 20x20 Initiative in Latin America, restoring 20 million hectares by 2020; the Agadir Commitment in Mediterranean countries to restore 8 million hectares; and the Asia-Pacific region where the FAO-led the effort to develop the Asia-Pacific Forest and Landscape Restoration Strategy and Action Plan, endorsed in 2017.

Most importantly, the FAO, with Korean support, has been able to help many countries make progress in restoring their degraded land through a variety of interventions. Today, almost 20 countries receive technical support for restoration from the FAO.

In particular, the expansion of financial mobilization for the FLR has shown tremendous success. The project, which started in 2014 with $500,000 per year from the Korea Forest Service (the only donor at first), has grown steadily with additional support from Sweden, France, Germany and the Global Environment Facility (GEF), bringing in an additional $60 million of funding for country restoration projects.

Overall, the project budget will increase more than 10 times in four years since the project began, and direct support to countries for the FLR by the FAO has expanded from seven countries to more than 20.

North Korea is one of the most vulnerable countries to natural disasters such as floods, landslides and droughts mainly caused by deforestation and degraded land. North Korea's deforestation and degradation are due to over-exploitation of forest resources and unplanned conversion of forests to agricultural use for self-sufficiency in food production and energy demand.

North Korean also has made significant efforts to restore deforested land but has not made much progress due to insufficient resources available in poor economic circumstances, especially from the U.N. sanctions. Thus, If South Korea and the international community help North Korea with financial support and technical knowledge and experience from their success story, North Korea will be a success story of forest and landscape restoration.

To succeed in landscape restoration in North Korea, it is necessary to invest large-scale resources over a long period. Therefore, participation and support by the international community are essential. Based on the successful experience of the FLRM already mentioned, I would propose the following strategies.

First, a strong political commitment and interest by concerned countries to support North Korea's reforestation and restoration efforts internationally are needed with an explicit reference to the global restoration context, such as the Bonn Challenge and New York Declaration on Forests. The commitment will contribute to backing up to mobilize various international organizations and donors to participate in North Korea's forest and landscape restoration actively.

Second, an international cooperation framework is vital to help implement the political declarations and to promote cooperation and financial support by international partners. A dedicated organization and an advisory group also should be established to fulfill the commitment.

An "Advisory Group" for reforestation and restoration of North Korea could be organized, including countries surrounding and interested in the Korean Peninsula, as well as forest and environment-related funding organizations such as the Green Climate Fund (GCF) and the Global Environment Facility (GEF), the international institutions specialized in the FLR, such as the UNCCD, IUCN and World Resources Institute, etc.

The FAO, as an international neutral forum, could play a leading role in convening and organizing such an Advisory Group, given its presence and experience in North Korea, expertise and experience in the FLR, financial mobilization capacity and strong convening power.

Third, large-scale financial mobilization will be one of the most crucial factors for achieving the scale of implementation needed. Reforestation and landscape restoration in North Korea will require very significant funding and investment over decades, with resources mobilized from many financial partners beyond the Korea Peninsula.

Access to and the ability to secure large-scale financing from multilateral funding bodies such as the Global Environment Facility and Green Climate Fund, bilateral aid agencies and private sector actors with strategic approaches will be essential.

Developing thematic FLR projects in conjunction with water management, climate change, environment protection, food security and poverty and disaster reduction will be an important strategy to ensure a comprehensive approach that delivers both environmental and socioeconomic objectives through large-scale restoration. Given its experience in these areas, the FAO has included the mobilization of financial resources and technical support through international cooperation in the proposals it has developed for DPRK support.

Finally, an improved political climate for international cooperation and support to North Korea will be necessary to move ahead at the scale required. Based on recent discussions between the two Koreas and other international partners, a more favorable environment seems to be evolving, and improved international confidence to work together to achieve common goals related to sustainable development on the Korean Peninsula will be important.

We need the active engagement of all concerned parties to find the political, technical and financial cooperation required to achieve large-scale restoration in DPRK that will lead to environmental security, reduced poverty, better food security and improved livelihoods for all Korean people.

Douglas L. McGuire is a coordinator for the forest and landscape restoration mechanism at the United Nations Food Agriculture Organization (FAO).