The four projects in our current portfolio represent a diverse set of entry points to carbon work across various contexts, value chains, and ecosystem services. Three of the four grants support the actions of smallholder-serving organizations that have not yet developed carbon projects.
At an aggregate level, if implemented, these projects will impact 45k farmers and regenerate 377k hectares of land, remove over 560k tons of carbon, and avoid over 5.3 million tons of carbon emissions over thirty years. Over the same implementation horizon, assuming a carbon price of $25 per ton for removal and $12 for avoidance, the portfolio will generate $77.6 million in revenue.
Determine if it is feasible to measure and verify the carbon emission mitigation levels on fields of no-burn rice farming practice adopters in Myanmar
Member: Proximity Designs
Location: Delta agro-ecological region in Lower Myanmar
Size: 2,500 farmers who own and manage more than 5,000 hectares of rice-growing land
Type of intervention: REDD
Advancing Conservation, Agriculture, and Livelihoods in Oromia (ACAL)
Member: Digital Green Foundation
Location: Belete Gera Forest (Gera, Gomma, and Shebe Sombo Woredas), Jimma Zone, Oromia Region, Ethiopia.
Size: 3,336 hectares of agroforestry
Type of intervention: Agroforestry
The Zoró REDD+ & Reforestation Project
Member: Forest Trends
Location: Zoró Indigenous Territory, Northwest of Mato Grosso state, Brazil
Size: The total size of Zoró Indigenous Territory is over 355,000.00 hectares. The project focus area is 2,000 hectares, where the generation of carbon credits and restoration co-benefits will be assessed.
Type of intervention: REDD
Economy of Love
Member: SEKEM (aka Egyptian Biodynamic Association)
Location: Egypt
Size: 12,000 ha
Type of intervention: Sustainable agriculture (soil carbon)
Application process
We solicited a first round of applications from our members for pre-feasibility project proposals and projects where CASH could assist members in a hybrid market development and commercial role, or where we could assist a member overcome a barrier to scale.
We received five applications, and we are pleased to extend support to each in the form of targeted funding and technical assistance from two carbon experts. One project has since been withdrawn by the member. Project proposals from Digital Green, Forest Trends, and Proximity Designs will be supported with grants of $50,000 each plus technical assistance to complete pre-feasibility assessments. A fourth project proposed by SEKEM is already generating revenue through carbon credits. An award of $30,000 will support SEKEM to support actions to address specific bottlenecks undermining farmer onboarding and measurement, reporting, and verification (MRV). The grant to SEKEM will also support the development of a case study about the development and roll-out of SEKEM’s EOL Standard to communicate insights about the process of developing a smallholder standard and taking a project to market for the benefit of CASH’s learning agenda and the field more broadly.
Subjecting these projects to pre-feasibility assessments is not a box-checking exercise in which we identify ‘winners’ to progress toward project registration. It is more about identifying and developing projects that reveal existing barriers and frictions to smallholder participation in climate finance and project development and new pathways that enable more smallholders – and smallholder-serving organizations – to access climate finance. We expect to learn a great deal from projects that pass easily through the assessment phase as well as those that struggle and do not advance in the existing structure of carbon markets and its enabling environment
Pre-feasibility, feasibility, and project development activities and assessments will be leveraged for learning to inform future project development and advocacy work. As a coalition, we will use this learning for problem-solving, to push markets to be more responsive to smallholder needs, to create transformations in existing markets to expand access to climate finance streams, and to initiate new sources of income supportive of smallholder climate action and ecosystem services.