The Global Peatlands Initiative is an effort made by leading experts and institutions formed in 2016 by 13 founding members at the UNFCCC COP in Marrakech, Morocco.
[1] The mission of the Initiative is to protect and conserve peatlands as the world's largest terrestrial organic carbon stock and to prevent it from being emitted into the atmosphere.
By conserving and restoring peatlands globally, they can continue to form an essential natural carbon sink and facilitate greenhouse gas emissions reduction.
Despite their value in mitigating climate change, peatlands worldwide are under increased threat from drainage for agriculture, forestry, resource extraction and infrastructure development.
[5] The Global Peatlands Initiative is an international partnership formed by 13 founding members at the UNFCCC COP in Marrakech, Morocco, in late 2016.
Indonesia and the Republic of Congo took their partnership one step further and signed a Memorandum of Understanding on Peatlands knowledge and experience sharing to solidify further collaboration.
The resolution urges "Member States and other stakeholders to give greater emphasis to the conservation, sustainable management and restoration of peatlands worldwide".
As a first step in filling the information gap, the Initiative launched its first joint product in November 2017—Smoke On Water – Countering Global Threats from Peatland Loss and Degradation.
Source:[9] The Global Peatlands Initiative co-wrote a chapter the UN Environment's publication: Frontiers 2018/19: Emerging Issues of Environmental Concern launched in March 2019.
It also provides a valuable baseline for improvement against future assessments and paves the way for the development of a comprehensive global peatland inventory, as called for in the UNEA4/16 Resolution.