The UN General Assembly declared 2021 – 2030 as the United Nations Decade on Ecosystem Restoration (the UN Decade). During the Decade’s first five years, the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) and the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) as leading organizations of the UN Decade, together with numerous partners and collaborators, have developed a powerful foundation to support and scale efforts to prevent, halt, and reverse the degradation of ecosystems worldwide. This includes showcasing success stories, creating essential guidance, tools, and resources, and raising awareness of the importance of effective ecosystem restoration.
As a key UN Decade partner, the Society for Ecological Restoration (SER) is delighted to host a delegation from the UN Decade at its 11th World Conference, SER2025. On Friday 3 October, the UN Decade Pavilion will include workshops and presentations to inspire and build momentum for the second half of the Decade.
Sharing the Success of World Restoration Flagships
The UN Decade Flagship Program was established to recognise and highlight the most promising examples of effective large-scale and long-term restoration. Nominated projects were assessed on their adherence to the 10 Restoration Principles of the UN Decade, developed collaboratively by FAO, SER, the IUCN Commission on Ecosystem Management (CEM), and other partners.
The World Restoration Flagships have placed into active restoration millions of hectares of forests, grasslands, mangroves, wetlands, farmlands, and other degraded ecosystems, to improve ecological integrity, support biodiversity, transform food production, provide clean water, and create jobs in communities around the world. Importantly, they offer valuable blueprints for success that can be replicated in other regions and scales.
Promoting Standards of Practice for Consistency and Scale
Ecosystem restoration is a complex process with great potential to deliver net gain for nature and people; however, if not implemented effectively, these benefits may not be achieved and ecosystems may be further degraded.
To support the direct application of the UN Decade’s 10 Restoration Principles to restoration projects, a team of UN Decade partners, led by IUCN CEM, FAO, and SER, in consultation with hundreds of experts from more than 57 countries, developed the Standards of Practice to Guide Ecosystem Restoration (SOPs).
They include more than 300 recommendations for the assessment, planning, implementation, and monitoring and evaluation of restoration projects.
Recognizing that creating resources is not enough to innovate guidance into practice, FAO, in collaboration with SER and IUCN CEM, is developing:
- an e-learning course to unpack the concepts detailed in the Standards
- a searchable navigation tool to assist users in identification of specific content and resources, and
- a decision-support and self-assessment tool that allows users to build the recommended practices into their project proposals and plans, and to assess alignment with recommended practices for existing projects
Beta versions of these tools will be presented at SER2025 at the UN Pavilion on Friday 3 October. Input and feedback from participants will help inform and improve the tools available to deliver effective restoration in support of global, regional, and national restoration targets.
Monitoring Tools for Transparency and Certainty
An essential factor for success in restoration is the ability to measure outcomes consistently, accurately, and transparently. The Framework for Ecosystem Restoration Monitoring (FERM) was launched in 2022 with tools, platforms, and data to align restoration actions with scientific insights. Developed by FAO in consultation with the Monitoring Task Force of the UN Decade, the FERM supports the objectives of the UN Decade and Target 2 of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, which seeks to restore 30% of degraded ecosystems by 2030.
By offering scalable, transparent, and harmonized monitoring tools, the FERM enables governments, NGOs, Indigenous Peoples, local communities, researchers, and other stakeholders to register initiatives, share data, and showcase best practices, ultimately fostering collaboration and strengthening the global restoration movement. The FERM includes a registry of restoration initiatives, a geospatial platform for data visualization, a search engine for accessing initiatives and good practices, and a forthcoming dashboard.
In alignment with the overarching theme of SER2025—moving from commitment to action—the FAO will host a workshop on how to best use FERM’s tools, encouraging the exchange of knowledge and expertise to build capacity in support of Target 2 of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (KM-GBF).
To learn more about these initiatives and other developments throughout the UN Decade, join us on Friday 3 October, at the UN Decade Pavilion. More details can be found on the conference schedule.