Forest Cover and Carbon Monitoring in the Panay Mountain Range

The purpose of this study was to assess the avoided deforestation and resulting reduction of forest carbon emission during both phases of the Forest and Climate Protection Project in Panay (ForClim I and II) from 2011 to 2017. For this, the forest cover changes in the Panay Mountain Range (PMR) before 2010 (start of ForClim I), from 2010 to 2014 (ForClim I) and from 2014 to 2017 (ForClim II) were considered. To assess the deforestation rate before the start of the project, the land cover maps published by the National Mapping and Resource Information Authority (NAMRIA) in 2003 and 2010 were used as baseline. These maps have not been updated since then and no official land cover figures are available for the years after 2010. The project team therefore used Google Earth satellite images to assess the forest cover changes from 2010 until 2014 and 2017.