Understanding Land Use in the UNFCCC

While greenhouse gas emissions from land use have the same warming effect on the atmosphere as other emissions, land use is different from other sectors in a number of ways. As a consequence, reporting and accounting of emissions from land use has developed under the United National Framework Convention for Climate Change (UNFCCC) differently to other sectors. It has come to be seen as an arcane and complex subject, impenetrable to the average person and even to skilled negotiators. The objective of the Guide is to change this perception and increase the technical understanding of how human induced emissions and removals from the land sector—within climate change circles referred to as land use, land use change and forestry (LULUCF) or agriculture, forests and other land use (AFOLU)—are treated in terms of reporting and accounting under the UNFCCC.