Assessment of compliance with the LULUCF criteria at national level
Article 5
Member States shall require economic operators to provide audited information that confirms compliance with the criteria on land use, land use change and forestry (LULUCF) at national level. To that end, economic operators shall provide accurate, up-to-date, and verifiable evidence that the country or regional economic integration organisation from which the forest biomass originates, is Party to the Paris Agreement and fulfils either of the following two sets of conditions: (i) it has submitted a nationally determined contribution (NDC), under the 2015 Paris Agreement on Climate Change following the 21st Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, that meets the following requirements: (a) the NDC includes the agriculture, forestry and land use sectors, either combined as one agriculture, forestry and other land use (AFOLU) sector, or as agriculture and LULUCF sectors separately; (b) the NDC explains how the agriculture, forestry and land use sectors have been considered in the NDC; (c) the NDC counts the emissions and removals from the agriculture, forestry and land use sectors against the country’s overall emission reduction target, including emissions associated with harvesting of forest biomass; or (ii) there are national or sub-national laws, applicable to the area of harvest, to conserve and enhance carbon stocks and sinks in forests. In addition, evidence shall be provided that the reported LULUCF sector emissions do not exceed removals, which may be proven by providing evidence that reported LULUCF sector emissions do not exceed removals on average over the 10 years preceding the harvesting of the forest biomass and that carbon stocks and sinks are conserved or enhanced between the last two successive 10-year periods preceding the harvesting of forest biomass. In order to minimise the administrative burden for economic operators, Member States may provide up-to-date information on the elements referred to in this Article to the operators.