Main event: The ‘ABCs of Forest’ Cooking Show
Date: 21 March 2025
Time: 12:30-15:00 EAT
Venue: UN Gigiri Complex, Nairobi
This year’s International Day of Forests will highlight the crucial role forests play in food security, nutrition, and livelihoods under the theme “Forests and Food.”
As part of the global commemoration, a live cooking demonstration will take place at UN Gigiri Campus in Nairobi, featuring a local chef and regional participants from the UN-REDD Programme's benefit-sharing global knowledge exchange. They will prepare three dishes that symbolize the ABCs of Forests through key ingredients. While cooking, they will discuss how forests contribute to sustainable food systems and the policy changes needed ahead of COP30 in Brazil.
The event will be livestreamed to engage a global audience and raise awareness about the critical need to protect forests while ensuring food security.
About the theme and key message
With unsustainable food systems driving deforestation and biodiversity loss, the messaging will focus on “The ABCs of Forests: Adapt, Balance, Change”—a call to rethink how forests and food systems interact, with a message to COP30 in Belem, Brazil.
The ABC’s of Forests:
A – Adapt food systems to work with forests not against them. Unsustainable agriculture expansion drives deforestation, threatening biodiversity and climate stability. Sustainable and forest-positive farming practices are key.
B – Balance and share benefits equitably and effectively. Forests provide livelihoods, culture, and ecosystem services - yet Indigenous Peoples and local communities are often ignored. Equitable benefit sharing schemes can empower them as stewards of our forests.
C – Change policies to put forests at the heart of climate action. COP30 will be held in the Amazon city of Belém, Brazil, providing the perfect place to push for strong ambition and commitments that prioritize forests in national climate action plans.
