Key messages for the ASEAN Social Forestry Network REDD+ and social forestry programs have both benefits and costs. Understanding who is bearing the costs of these policies and programs, and ensuring fair compensation, will be important to achieving effective and equitable outcomes. Equity depends on the context and perceptions of the affected stakeholders. Including considerations of equity in the design of REDD+ and social forestry policies can positively influence the policies’ outcomes and sustainability. REDD+ and social forestry requires an inclusive process. Purposeful multistakeholder participation throughout the decision-making process can increase the credibility and legitimacy of a program and enhance its chances of successful outcomes

Benefit sharing (BS) approaches in community forestry (CF) are differentiated into: rights allocation-based, input-based and performance-based, from initiation to implementation and each approach has specific and complementary roles in ensuring effectiveness, efficiency and equity of benefit sharing mechanisms (BSMs).

The issue of REDD+ benefit sharing has captured the attention of policymakers and local communities because the success of REDD+ will depend greatly on the design and implementation of its benefit?sharing mechanism. Despite a large body of literature on potential benefit?sharing mechanisms for REDD+, the field has lacked global comparative analyses of national REDD+ policies and of the political?economic influences that can either enable or impede the mechanisms. Similarly, relatively few studies have investigated the political?economic principles underlying existing benefit?sharing policies and approaches. This working paper builds on a study of REDD+ policies in 13 countries to provide a global overview and up?to?date profile of benefit?sharing mechanisms for REDD+ and of the political?economic factors affecting their design and setting. Five types of benefit?sharing models relevant to REDD+ and natural resource management are used to create an organising framework for identifying what does and does not work and to examine the structure of rights under REDD+. The authors also consider the mechanisms in light of five prominent discourses on the question of who should benefit from REDD+ and, by viewing REDD+ through a 3E (effectiveness, efficiency, equity) lens, map out some of the associated risks for REDD+ outcomes. Existing benefit?sharing models and REDD+ projects have generated initial lessons for building REDD+ benefit?sharing mechanisms. However, the relevant policies in the 13 countries studied could lead to carbon ineffectiveness, cost inefficiency and inequity because of weak linkages to performance or results, unclear tenure and carbon rights, under?representation of certain actors, technical and financial issues related to the scope and scale of REDD+, potential elite capture and the possible negative side effects of the decentralisation of authority. Furthermore, the enabling factors for achieving 3E benefit?sharing mechanisms are largely absent from the study countries. Whether REDD+ can catalyse the necessary changes will depend in part on how the costs and benefits of REDD+ are shared, and whether the benefits are sufficient to affect a shift in entrenched behaviour and policies at all levels of government. The successful design and implementation of benefit?sharing mechanisms – and hence the legitimacy and acceptance of REDD+ – depend on having clear objectives, procedural equity and an inclusive process and on engaging in a rigorous analysis of the options for benefit sharing and their potential effects on beneficiaries and climate mitigation efforts.

The basis of this book is the disparity between the science of conservation biology and the design and execution of biodiversity conservation projects in the field. The book argues for an 'evidence-based approach', drawing information from fifteen projects in the Lower Mekong regions, with the aim of allowing more effective integrated conservation projects.

Key points In the absence of robust national or subnational policies for benefit sharing, land-use change initiatives in Indonesia have developed their own approaches to distributing benefits. At the local level, support and capacity building are needed to strengthen intermediary institutions in order to improve governance and increase legitimacy when deciding how to share benefits.Nonmonetary benefits such as land tenure, capacity building, infrastructure and access to natural resources have been especially important. However, in some cases there are nonmonetary burdens associated with intended benefits.The legitimacy of benefit-sharing arrangements is determined more by the actors involved than the type of land-use change associated with them. Conservation initiatives, REDD+ projects and oil palm initiatives all exhibited both high and low levels of legitimacy in their benefit-sharing arrangements.The legitimacy of benefit-sharing arrangements can be compromised by the lack of broad consultation with local actors including customary authorities, lack of community control over access to land snd limited livelihoods options for communities.

​It was hoped that by paying forest dependent peoples and countries for their “service” of conserving their forests, REDD+ would lead to a reduction in deforestation greenhouse gases. The complexities have, however, left some ambiguities. It was never agreed who would pay for the program, and it has been criticized as ignoring the root causes of forest loss. Considering the motivations of those who promoted REDD+ this book proposes remedies to its shortfalls and recommends more efficient, equitable and effective conservation policies.

Operationalizing safeguards in national REDD+ architectures remains a major challenge in most REDD+ countries, particularly in the area of benefit sharing. Effective, efficient and equitable outcomes of REDD+ require effective, efficient and equitable implementation of safeguards.