A major milestone: Peru officially includes Amazonian peatlands in its NDCs
On 15 June 2023, the Peruvian proposal for a Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) under the Paris Agreement, "Conservation and Sustainable Management of Amazonian Peatlands", was approved by Peru's High-Level Commission on Climate Change.
This approval represents a great achievement for the peatlands of Peru and the world, allowing the protection of 2.5 M ha of peatlands for a mitigation period from 2023 to 2030. It also enabled the identification of nine important enabling conditions for its upcoming implementation, including the generation of technical-scientific peatland-related information, capacity building, and establishment of financial mechanisms, among others. This measure is being implemented in three departments of the Amazon of Peru: Loreto, San Martín and Ucayali.
The elaboration and approval of this NDC have been the result of great collaborative work between the Peruvian Ministry of Environment (MINAM) and a specialized national and international team, where UNEP-GPI has been proudly part of the technical team that supported the development of this measure.
This NDC is one of the 66 Peruvian mitigation measures, which together aim to achieve the commitment to reach a 40% reduction in the country's greenhouse gas emissions by 2030, compared to 2015.
"Many of our tropical peatlands are rich in carbon, but also in biodiversity. That is why in Peru, we have established a measure related to our climate contributions that addresses our peatlands. Through this measure we also seek to contribute to the development of our communities and Indigenous peoples, who live and depend on these ecosystems", said Berioska Quispe, General Director of Climate Change and Desertification of MINAM, during GLF Peatlands 2024: The Climate Solution We Forgot.
Next steps for Peruvian peatlands
The peatlands of Peru - and Latin America and the Caribbean in general - urgently need to be better understood and receive the recognition they deserve, as outlined in the Global Peatlands Assessment. "We need to improve the knowledge we have about peatlands, as there is a lot that is not being recognized through the financial mechanisms, but through the information generated by various research institutes, we can improve and increase the recognition of peatlands in Peru and the world", further explained Berioska Quispe.
Additionally, the General Director mentioned that after the development of its Amazonian peatlands NDC, Peru is also looking to develop a measure to address its Andean peatlands, locally known as bofedales, which are estimated to cover an area of approximately 1 052 210.6 hectares, according to the country's latest National Inventory of Bofedales.
Read the official inclusion of this new NDC in the Catalogue of Peru's mitigation measures updated to 2024 and, learn more about the importance of Amazonian peatlands, locally known as aguajales, in this video developed by our GPI partner, Wildlife Conservation Society.
Further resources:
Global Landscapes Forum (2020) Digital Conference - side event "Why peatlands matter for food security" [video recording; in Spanish]
Think Landscape / Global Landscapes Forum: Daniella Silva, "Peru’s peatlands are beginning to share their secrets – and policymakers are listening" (2021)
Profanape: "Aguaje: the Amazonian superfruit protagonist of the National Seminar "Aguaje for life"" (2021)
UNFCCC COP26 – Global Peatlands Pavilion (2021) - side event "The Indigenous Peoples Platform to face Climate Change in Peru" [video recording]
Photo: Pacaya-Samiria National Reserve in Loreto, Peru. Credit: Astrid Sotomayor Chavez.