Land-sector targets, inside the corporate target
The Forest, Land and Agriculture (FLAG) guidance, published in its first full version in 2022 with support from WWF, and involving technical input from experts including those from TNC, EDF, and a wide range of AFOLU specialists, was a landmark development. For the first time, companies in land-intensive sectors, including food, agriculture, forestry, retail with agricultural supply chains, were required to set separate, science-based targets for their land-sector emissions and removals, accounting for deforestation, land-use change, soil carbon, and forest management alongside their energy-related emissions.
Removals as a required component of the target
FLAG requires companies to address both emissions reductions and land-based removals within the same science-based framework. That means forests and restored land aren’t just an optional add-on, they are a required component of the target itself for FLAG-sector companies. The guidance specifies that companies must follow the mitigation hierarchy, including to reduce land-sector emissions first, then deliver removals through improved land management and restoration, and only then consider any residual neutralisation.
The no-deforestation deadline: December 2025 to December 2030
No-deforestation commitments have been a central and contested element. The original FLAG guidance required companies to commit to eliminating deforestation by December 2025, a deadline that passed without most companies achieving it. In response, SBTi opened an urgent consultation in October 2025 on updates to FLAG Criteria 1 and 4, proposing a revised no-deforestation deadline of December 2030 (with up to two years from target submission for first-time submitters), and updating commodity coverage to include all main deforestation-linked commodities globally. The final FLAG Guidance Version 1.2 was published in March 2026, incorporating those updates and aligning with the GHG Protocol Land Sector and Removals Standard (published January 2026). The timber and wood fiber pathway remains temporarily suspended pending further review.
Mandatory demand for land-based removals, and the REDD gap
For forest carbon markets, FLAG creates mandatory demand for land-based removals from a large set of corporate buyers as part of the target. Companies that are required to set FLAG targets and choose to include land-based removals must source them from activities that meet the standard’s methodology requirements, which in turn creates pressure for high-integrity land-sector carbon projects to exist at scale. If they don’t, FLAG companies cannot fully meet their targets. However, the narrow focus on removals undermines demand for REDD at a time when forests continue to be lost around the world.
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