Overview of the REDD+ SIS

Overview of the REDD+ Safeguards Information System for Papua New Guinea

In 2020, the Government of Papua New Guinea (GoPNG) established (NEC Decision No. 343/2020) the REDD+ Safeguard Information System (SIS) Framework that outlines the SIS’s objectives, core functions, necessary institutional arrangements and identification of information needs and sources. The SIS was established to ensure that PNG’s implementation of REDD+ comply with the Cancun Safeguards.

The SIS for PNG is a framework established to ensure that REDD+ is implemented in a socially and environmentally responsible manner and aim to ensure that REDD+ actions not only contribute to mitigating climate change but also provide social, environmental, and governance benefits. The SIS aligns with the Cancun Safeguards as outlined in the United Nation Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Decision 1/CP.16 and aims to provide transparent and consistent information on how these safeguards are addressed and respected. The UNFCCC requires that county parties develop a SIS, ensuring consistency of the REDD+ policies and measure (PAMs) with the Cancun safeguards throughout the implementation of REDD+, and the provision of a Summary of Information (SOI) demonstrating how the safeguards have been addressed and respected to the UNFCCC. This is linked to the delivery of the results-based payments from REDD+ PAMs. PNG has since established the SIS, ensuring consistency in policy adherence and submitted the first SOI to the UNFCCC in 2020.

Although there are no official guidelines on how countries are supposed to set up a system for providing information on how safeguards are addressed and respected, Parties to the UNFCCC have agreed on some broad guidance on the characteristics of a SIS. Namely,it should:

• Provide transparent and consistent information that is accessible by all relevant stakeholders and updated on a regular basis;
• Be transparent and flexible to allow for improvements over time;
• Provide information on how all the safeguards referred to in appendix I to decision 1/CP.16 are being addressed and respected;
• Be country-driven and implemented at the national level; and
• Build upon existing systems, as appropriate.

The framework of PNG’s SIS is composed of (1) Objective of the SIS, (2) Description of each Cancun Safeguard, (3) Indicators of the SIS, 4) Functions and Institutional Arrangements of the SIS and the (5) SIS’s Technological systems requirements. These components are fully detailed in the Safeguard Information System Framework Document for PNG.