Addis Ababa — The Government of Norway has announced 25 million USD in funding to support Ethiopia's ambitions, prolonging its decade-long forest partnership with the East African nation.
The Norwegian government announced the funding at the Africa Climate Summit in Nairobi to support Ethiopia's undertakings to avert the impacts of climate change, according to Minister of Planning and Development.
It is noted that forest protection and restoration play a vital role in Ethiopia's efforts to reduce emissions.
The Ethiopian government has pledged to ensure sustainable use or protection of all remaining forests in the country and to double the forest cover by 2030.
Through the Green Legacy initiative, Ethiopia has planted more than 25 billion seedlings in the first phase of the initiative since 2019. In June, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed disclosed that Ethiopia will have planted a total of 31 billion seedlings by the end of this year's Green Legacy planting season.
Accordingly, Norway's forthcoming support to Ethiopia will contribute to scaling up work towards the country's comprehensive efforts on climate change through forestry.
"I recognize the progress that Ethiopia has made in the forest sector. Large areas of biodiversity-rich forest are now protected from unsustainable use, producing eco-system services that benefit local communities, the country and wider region," said Climate and Environment Minister of Norway, Espen Barth Eide, on the occasion of the announcement.
It is learned that the new pledge is topping up Norway's investment of more than 162 million USD to Ethiopia's forest sector over the last 10 years.
It is also mentioned that the decade-long support has contributed to the protection of one million hectares of natural forests, which are now under sustainable management schemes.
It has also contributed to restoring one million hectares of degraded forests and the establishment of 75,000 hectares of high-value plantation forests.
Some 300,000 livelihoods have been created and enhanced as a result of the partnership, an official report from the Norwegian government indicated.
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Norway's International Climate and Forest Initiative (NICFI) was established in 2008 and is the government of Norway's largest international effort to help combat climate change and preserve nature by protecting the world's tropical forests.
To achieve this, Norway has entered into bilateral partnerships with several of the most important tropical forest countries in the world, across all three of the largest rainforest basins.
NICFI has invested more than 5 billion USD to protect forests since 2008.
