Verra's Jurisdictional Nested REDD program (JNR): How it works and why it might not.

Today I want to discuss Verra's new Jurisdictional and Nested REDD+ program (JNR). This is a new way of calculation baselines that all projects will have to follow in 2025, and it's largely touted as a solution to over-issuance.
I briefly walk through how it works; first by creating a state-level estimate of deforestation rates, and then by creating maps of forest risk to say where deforestation will occur in the future.
Then I walk through where it might go wrong. I bring up the following points:
(1) Maps are not being peer-reviewed (scientifically), and they're not being made by independent labs. Anybody can submit maps, including project developers -- it just requires a sign-off by a state official. Many project developers and even states already create seemingly biased maps to obtain too many credits.
(2) The deforestation risk maps are extremely simplistic, and amount to saying deforestation will happen in the future next to where it happened in the past. This will result in an inaccurate prediction of risk in most forests (I give many examples).
(3) The approach might be subject to gerrymandering, where people could draw their project boundaries only in areas that have high perceived risk on the risk map, but low timber value.
(4) The approach might be subject to sinister manipulations, such as the strategic placement of clearcuts around a project, or a jurisdiction repealing anti-deforestation laws a few years prior to enrolling.
(5) The baseline is not dynamic, the baseline is recalculated every 6 years rather than every year.
(6) Verra allows for many exceptions of it's existing rules, and there's a risk that this might continue even with a new rule-set.
(7) This system does not address credits that were wrongly issued in the past. Can a project that was wrongly issued with 10s of millions of credits ever offset it's offsets?
Overall, I don't see this as a substantial improvement over the current system. I suspect that some of the worst offending REDD+ projects will receive a lot fewer credits because of the jurisdictional cap on credit issuance. Beyond that, many projects may continue to be substantially over-issued credits.
I hope I'm wrong about these forecasts. Only time and some real-world examples will tell.

[@sciencefirst4212]

Hey Elias! Thanks for breaking this down. Since you're practically giving away these projects anyways (with a little digging), why not just name them outright? Would help people shine spotlights on the bad practices rife throughout the industry. Thanks!

[@xmz6040]

how much verra will pay per hectare of carbon credit project?

[@benjaminwarr]

On mapmaking. If the data is made freely available and the algorithms that gowith them, then I think it is fine toletthe privatesector, and may mean independent third party guys make the maps. They may even make better maps using more elaborate procedures, publish the method and algo, then using much more frequent and intense field survey, check both. Standard and 'independent published', see which does better. I have far less faith in the Big institutions than you do I guess. I also like to see incentives to innovate and get better. I also want to see Africans able tomake maps. None of the institutions you mention are based in Africa .