National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Recording >>

Slides [PDF]

Naikoa Aguilar-Amuchastegui is WWF-US’s Forest Carbon Science Director. He has been leading WWF’s efforts in REDD+ measuring, reporting, and verification (MRV) for the last 6 years. Originally from Colombia, Naikoa received his MS in tropical forest management and conservation of biodiversity from the Tropical Agronomic Research and Higher Education Center (CATIE) in Costa Rica and a PhD from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in natural resource science with a specialization in GIS and remote sensing. During his academic career, Naikoa concentrated on the assessment of the ecological sustainability of tropical forest management through observable linkages among key forest health indicator groups commonly assessed in the field (e.g. dung beetles, butterflies, birds), management variables such as logging intensity, and forest structure parameters observable via remote sensing. Before joining WWF, Naikoa was Assistant Professor of GIS and Remote Sensing in the University of North Carolina-Wilmington’s Department of Environmental Studies.

For the last 6 years, WWF has been actively involved in supporting the development of REDD+ country capacities towards the design and implementation of MRV activities required by the REDD+ mechanism. As part of this learning by doing process, WWF has been collecting lessons learned from its teams, partners, as well as those involved in the assessment of the deliverables, including UNFCCC technical assessment team members. This talk will present a synthesis of the lessons collected so far.