The first steps to kick start a global REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation) scheme to halt deforestation and build on progress in Copenhagen have been taken at a meeting in Paris (11 March 2010). A further $1 billion has been promised and a ten-nation steering group established to drive the implementation of a global avoided deforestation and forest carbon enhancement mechanism over the next three years. French President Nicola Sarkozy hosted the closed-door International Conference on the Major Forest Basins, the first high-level gathering on forests since the UN Copenhagen climate conference in December. It drew representatives from more than 60 nations - donor developed countries and forest-rich developing nations - along with UN and World Bank representatives. REDD negotiations were one of the few areas of major progress in Copenhagen, with a final agreement prevented only by the lack of an overarching climate agreement which would have drawn in REDD text as one of its components.

A number of technical and social issues surrounding avoided deforestation activity were resolved at the Copenhagen talks, while the US, Australia, France, Japan, Norway and the UK made pledges worth $3.5 billion for fast-start funds to enable REDD+. The Paris conference saw this amount increased to $4.5 billion with additions from other donors. Germany has also promised to devote 20-30% of its overall 2010-2012 fast-start climate change funding to the initiative – an amount still subject to the budget planning process in Berlin.

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