The concept of gender support within the Programme has evolved and grown over time through the use of a “learning by doing” approach. Through experience across regions, it has been found most effective to integrate gender equality and women’s empowerment as both stand-alone and cross-cutting interventions across the Programme’s thematic areas and within its technical support at the local, national, regional and global levels. In that process, a major lesson that has been learned, and which now serves as a key best practice, is the need to ensure that gender support and guidance is developed and validated using a bottom-up approach . Specific emphasis has been placed on promoting the active and equitable involvement of local and indigenous women, in order to have their knowledge inform national REDD+ action.