There is a broad consensus that the success of climate mitigation strategies will in part depend on addressing governance challenges in the contexts in which these strategies are to play out. There are major corruption risks associated with carbon emissions reduction schemes such as REDD. First, REDD takes place in a corruption-prone sector. In many developing countries, the forestry sector faces corruption risks in the form of state looting, elite capture, theft and fraud. By facilitating illegal logging, deforestation and forest degradation, corrupt practices can critically undermine the success of climate mitigation schemes. In addition, specific governance challenges may be associated with emerging forest development practices and carbon trading schemes. These include inappropriate validation and verification, misappropriation of carbon rights, double counting and fraudulent trade of carbon credits.