Indonesia has experienced two major forest and land fire events in the past five years. According to government data, the 2015 and 2019 fire episodes led to the burning of around 2.6 million hectares and 1.6 million hectares,1 respectively. The fires and the resulting haze in 2019 led to...

The purpose of this study is to understand the legal and policy constraints and opportunities in each of the 17-carbon fund (CF) countries affecting women's land and forest tenure. The study also explores women's ability to exercise land and forest rights in statutory and customary systems; how...

Afghanistan has been in conflict and internal turmoil since the early 1970s, which has resulted in loss of life, insecurity, ethnic division, and wide-spread damage to the environment and natural resources. As citizens of one of the poorest nations in the world with an increasing poverty level...

Lao People's Democratic Republic (Lao PDR) has a comparative advantage in natural capital, which has fueled economic growth averaging around 8 percent per annum since 2000. The natural resource endowment comprises half of the country's wealth. Although forest cover declined 3.6 percent between...

This Country Forest Note (CFN) provides an upstream analysis of the status of forests and of investments and policies relevant to the forest sector in Vietnam. It looks at forests in a programmatic and cross-sectoral manner to strategically position the World Bank Group (WBG) to support the...

Natural capital in Lao PDR is a major source of wealth for the country and becomes even more strategic in times of economic stress. While forest products directly benefit vulnerable rural communities, ecosystem services from forests support key economic sectors such as energy, agriculture,...

Forests are an important economic and social resource, critical to the culture and livelihood of communities across Myanmar. Forest resources are key secondary income sources for more than half the rural population, and close to two-thirds of rural energy demands are met by traditional forest...