(UNFCCC Side Event) From Recognition to Implementation: A Roadmap for Forests as Global Infrastructure

​Forests are indispensable to climate stability, water security, food systems, biodiversity, and economic resilience. Yet they remain underrepresented in climate agreements, investment decisions, and global finance. This session will examine what it takes to recognise forests as strategic infrastructure in practice, making forest integrity a priority in public policy, investment, and international cooperation.

​The COP30 roadmaps highlight the need to protect forests and transition away from fossil fuels, but the two agendas are not yet sufficiently aligned. Energy choices promoted under one roadmap, including bioenergy expansion, could place greater pressure on the forests the other seeks to protect. The discussion will explore how countries can address these tensions while cutting fossil fuel production and use and limiting the extent and duration of warming above 1.5°C.

​The session will identify where implementation could stall and how countries, civil society, and successive COP Presidencies can build support to move both roadmaps forward. It will consider whether finance reaches those able to act, how progress can reflect forest condition as well as reductions in clearing, and how action can address the realities people face, from energy costs to secure livelihoods.