OpenForis is an initiative that provides free and open-source solutions for forest and land monitoring. Developed with the belief that innovative, accurate, and transparent forest monitoring can unlock the potential of forests for climate action and other benefits. It is a transformative accelerator working towards digital public goods offered by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), making cutting-edge forest monitoring capabilities widely accessible.
OpenForis addresses pressing global environmental challenges, including widespread deforestation, the urgent need to mitigate climate change, and the imperative for sustainable resource management and production. Its foundational principle is being free and open-source, which ensures the long-term sustainability of monitoring capacities by sharing solutions, documentation, and source code, fostering self-sufficiency, transparency, and eliminating vendor dependence. This approach also provides a cost-effective way to monitor forest cover and other critical land types.
Benefits
Free and Open-Source Nature: Open Foris is fundamentally a free and open-source initiative. This characteristic provides several key advantages. It makes advanced forest and land monitoring capabilities accessible to everyone, everywhere, ensuring that financial constraints do not impede access to essential monitoring solutions.- Comprehensive and Versatile Suite of Solutions Covering the Entire Monitoring Workflow: Open Foris offers a portfolio of powerful yet user-friendly platforms and solutions, each designed to address specific aspects of forest and land monitoring, enabling the generation of actionable insights. This integrated nature, covering the entire workflow from data collection in the field to sophisticated geospatial analysis and reporting, offers substantial value by streamlining processes and improving data compatibility.
- Proven Track Record and Significant Impact in Supporting Global Forestry Initiatives and International Reporting: Open Foris has demonstrated widespread adoption and significant impact across numerous countries
Use Cases
- National Forest Inventory and In-situ data collection: The Open Foris Initiative supports National Forest Inventories and Monitoring by providing open-source solutions such as Arena and Arena Mobile that enable countries to collect, manage, and analyse forest data with accuracy, transparency, and efficiency.
- Measurement, Reporting, and Verification (MRV) for Environmental Integrity: Open Foris is specifically designed to facilitate MRV with Environmental Integrity. A significant testament to this is that 91% of forest submissions from 65 countries to the UNFCCC have utilised Open Foris tools, highlighting its pivotal role in global climate reporting and MRV since 2014 to the present day.
- Addressing Deforestation and Supporting Deforestation-Free Supply Chains: Open Foris develops open-source solutions that tackle deforestation and promote sustainable commodity production by empowering smallholder farmers with solutions to support deforestation-free and transparent supply chains.
- Ecosystem Restoration Monitoring: Open Foris provides innovative technical solutions advancing ecosystem restoration as a powerful nature-based solution. The Framework for Ecosystem Restoration Monitoring (FERM) is a significant integrated solution provided by Open Foris, serving as a global platform for registering, monitoring, and sharing restoration efforts.
OpenForis Portfolio
Integrated Solutions &
Risk Assessment
Gambia’s National Forest Inventory goes digital and more precise with Open Foris solutions
The Gambia is transforming how it monitors and manages its forest, leaving behind paper-based data collection and embracing digital solutions to map, measure, and manage its forests with greater accuracy and efficiency. Led by the Gambia's Department of Forestry and supported by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the country is preparing for the next National Forest Inventory (NFI) – a key effort to track forest resources and guide decision-making. [read more →]
Cali, Colombia: New FAO forest monitoring solution supports Indigenous Peoples and smallholders
For Forest and Water Day, FAO launched a new Digital Public Good, Open Foris Whisp, which will help Indigenous Peoples and smallholder farmers produce forest monitoring information and support compliance with deforestation regulations. The open-source solution provides insights on different datasets from satellite-derived forest, land-use and tree-cover maps, ... [read more →]
Enhancing compliance with deforestation-free regulations and enabling local participation with Ground: Insights from user experiences in Ivory Coast
The European Union's Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) represents a step to reduce deforestation by mandating that companies and producers demonstrate that their products have not contributed to deforestation. However, the effectiveness of such regulatory frameworks relies on the accuracy and reliability of the data used to demonstrate compliance. [read more →]
