Reimagining land use in climate pledges: a call for high ambition

UK landscape, Scotland
The next round of NDCs must be more ambitious, realistic, and equitable, focusing on genuine emissions reductions while ensuring that land use strategies are environmentally sustainable and socially just. Empowering Indigenous Peoples and local communities through secure land tenure is key.

In the new climate guide from the Land Gap Report, the focus is squarely on rethinking how land use is integrated into Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs). NDCs are the national climate action plans underpinning global efforts to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement. However, the authors argue that the initial rounds of NDCs often fell short in addressing the complexities of land use, leading to an over-reliance on unrealistic land-based solutions like carbon removals, rather than cutting emissions at their source.

Land use as a climate solution—challenges and promises

The land sector has the potential to be both a significant carbon sink and an emissions source. Forests, peatlands, and grasslands store vast amounts of carbon and help regulate the Earth’s climate. However, land use change, such as deforestation for agriculture, releases significant amounts of greenhouse gases. The report highlights that previous NDCs too often resorted to land-based carbon sequestration methods, like tree planting and biomass burning, as a way to offset emissions from other sectors. Such strategies, while useful, have limits and can even backfire if they overlook local ecological and social contexts.

For instance, the large-scale tree planting schemes commonly proposed can sometimes lead to unintended negative outcomes. These include conversion of natural ecosystems, such as grasslands, into monoculture tree plantations, which in turn can threaten biodiversity and water resources. As the report notes, protecting and allowing natural ecosystems to regenerate is far more effective for carbon sequestration than establishing plantations. The focus should be on conserving existing high-integrity ecosystems and avoiding projects that require substantial land-use changes, potentially displacing local communities and damaging food security.

The importance of land tenure

A major theme in the report is the importance of secure land tenure as a foundation for effective climate action. The rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities must be recognised, as these groups often manage vast areas of global forests and other crucial ecosystems. Despite their essential role, many Indigenous and local communities lack formal legal recognition of their land rights, which exposes them to risks such as land-grabbing, forced displacement, and the undermining of traditional stewardship practices.

The report argues that recognising land rights and providing secure tenure is not only a matter of social justice but also a highly effective climate strategy. Communities with recognised land rights are better equipped to manage and protect natural resources sustainably. The report calls for future NDCs to include commitments to formalise these rights, streamline land titling and registration processes, and halt illegal encroachments. Empowering local communities and Indigenous Peoples through secure tenure rights is one of the most equitable and cost-effective strategies to protect remaining forests and mitigate climate impacts.

Key recommendations for ambitious NDCs

The report lays out several pathways for countries to achieve high-ambition land-sector contributions in their updated NDCs. These include:

  1. Protecting and restoring existing ecosystems: Instead of focusing on new tree plantations, efforts should aim at safeguarding intact forests, peatlands, and grasslands, which provide multiple co-benefits for climate, biodiversity, and local livelihoods
  2. Securing land tenure for Indigenous Peoples and local communities: Recognising land tenure rights is fundamental for sustainable land management. This ensures that those who have lived on and managed these lands for generations are empowered to continue their stewardship, which has proven to be more effective than top-down conservation initiatives.
  3. Transitioning agriculture towards sustainability: Shifting away from agro-industrial practices to agroecological methods, such as polyculture, agroforestry, and ecological livestock systems, can help build resilience in food systems while also reducing emissions.
  4. Avoiding reliance on offsets: The report criticises the heavy dependence on carbon offsets, particularly those involving land-based sequestration, as a way to balance continued fossil fuel emissions. True high-ambition NDCs should focus on genuine emissions reductions across all sectors, not just compensatory offsets.
    A realistic approach to climate pledges

One of the most striking insights from the report is its emphasis on the scale of land required for many existing pledges. Governments have proposed using up to a billion hectares for carbon sequestration—an area larger than the combined territories of South Africa, India, Turkey, and the European Union. This level of land use is not only unrealistic but also risks pushing ecosystems, land rights, and food security to the brink.

Moving forward, climate pledges need to prioritise the protection of natural ecosystems and incorporate transparent, socially responsible strategies that don’t overly burden the land sector as a catch-all solution. High-income countries, in particular, must reduce their dependence on land-based carbon removals and instead accelerate efforts to decarbonise other parts of their economies, such as energy and heavy industry.

The message is clear: the next round of NDCs must be more ambitious, realistic, and equitable, focusing on genuine emissions reductions while ensuring that land use strategies are environmentally sustainable and socially just. Empowering Indigenous Peoples and local communities through secure land tenure is central to this mission, as is recognising that the path to net-zero requires not just technological advances and policy shifts, but also a renewed commitment to preserving the health of our land and the rights of those who depend on it.

Read the report here