Training on carbon projects in Kenya
BlueSeeds’ mission to financially empower conservation project actors has led it to take an interest in the financing potential of Blue Carbon Ecosystems in recent years.
With our partners, our team seeks to develop conservation projects in this area, ensuring that they comply with rules of transparency, fairness and accessibility for communities.
We have very good support to set up these projects, thanks to a new actor who is democratising the development of carbon projects: Fair Carbon. We are part of their Blue Carbon Academy, a platform for learning and sharing with other carbon project developers.
Developing the WAM carbon project
Since 2022, our team has been working with the IUCN West and Central Africa on West African Mangrove (WAM), a blue carbon project aimed at providing West African communities (locals, NGOs et marine protected area managers) with the tools they need to independently sell carbon credits to finance the conservation of mangroves in the region.
So far, our team has done two field visits in Guinea Bissau to identify sites to develop the project and engage with our local partner ODZH. Through the fieldwork we understood the political, social and environmental needs of these sites.
During the idea incubation, our team encountered the complexity of developing a blue carbon project, highlighting the lack of clear and comprehensive technical and legal information for project developers and communities, and the funding gap created by prior investments necessary to start credit issuance.
Our collaboration with Fair Carbon guiding carbon project developers
Fair Carbon supports blue carbon projects that champion biodiversity, build resilience and engage communities on the frontlines of climate change.
What are Fair Carbon's activities?
Fair Carbon offers guidance to blue carbon project developers to devise their project, and evaluates, at the country level, the enabling conditions to set up blue carbon markets. They also connect carbon buyers and investors to high-quality blue carbon projects and help them understand what it takes to develop them.
Diana Denke / Fair Carbon
Timothée Cook / BlueSeeds
The Fair Carbon Pilot Program helps us build our capacities on carbon project development
- The Blue Carbon Academy, consisting in:
- Online modules to demystify the carbon market, and learn about carbon project development, restoration techniques, mangrove ecology and project governance
- Toolkits in finance and management for developing carbon projects
- Support provided by the Fair Carbon team
- Tailored thematic workshops
- Peer-to-peer learning
A first Annual Cohort Meeting with the Blue Carbon Academy in Kenya
Fair Carbon has decided to bring all its Blue Carbon Academy members near Mombasa, Kenya on June 23-27, 2024 with 3 objectives in mind:
- Meet in person to foster peer-to-peer learning and reinforce the cohort sense of belonging and shared purpose
- Experience first-hand what a successful blue carbon project looks like, and learn from actors on the ground
- Participate in practical learning workshops led by leading global experts
Our Operations Director Marie-Aude and our Science Officer and WAM Project Manager Timothée Cook made the trip.
BlueSeeds and the other members had the opportunity to share their feedback on the Blue Carbon Academy modules, and how we used them in the projects we are developing.
Diana Denke / Fair Carbon
Training with workshops on carbon project development
In Kenya, Fair Carbon offered its members workshops to help them strengthen their respective on carbon projects, on:
- Understanding mangrove ecosystems, ecology, and their state of health
- Designing restoration or conservation activities
- Carrying out carbon accounting for a project, where to look for high-quality data
- Finding applicable data and come-up with a high-level assessment of your project baseline and project scenarios
- Finding best financing options, and building project financial planning
Diana Denke / Fair Carbon
Timothée Cook / BlueSeeds
BlueSeeds was able to increase its expertise in:
- Restoration, thanks in particular to the presence of specialist Boone Kauffman from the University of Oregon, who taught us a great deal about mangrove ecology.
- Carbon accounting within the mangrove ecosystem, thanks to the presence of Ryan Moyer from TerraCarbon
- Carbon finance, its ins and outs and possible shifts towards more ‘traditional’ finance in the future, thanks to Diana Denke, co-founder of Fair Carbon
Diana Denke / Fair Carbon
Timothée Cook / BlueSeeds
Marie-Aude Sévin / BlueSeeds
Learning with field visits: discovering the Mikoko Pamoja carbon project
In addition to these workshops, Fair Carbon provided technical learning and showed us how a carbon project is organised in the field. We visited the Mikoko Pamoja project site in Gazi Bay and met the project team, and also the team of the Vanga Blue Forest project.
The Mikoko Pamoja project aims to strengthen mangrove restoration and protection through the involvement and participation of local communities. This is achieved through conservation activities, awareness-raising and the sale of carbon credits.
Marie-Aude Sévin / BlueSeeds
Timothée Cook / BlueSeeds
Timothée Cook / BlueSeeds
The project generates US$ 24,000 per year from the sale of carbon credits, which is used to support local development projects in water and sanitation, education, health and environment conservation.
We visited restoration sites that had suffered significant erosion in the past.
Our team learned more on the project’s activities and carbon measurement techniques. We also observed all the benefits created by the implementation of this blue carbon project for the local community.
Diana Denke / Fair Carbon
Diana Denke / Fair Carbon
What BlueSeeds learned
BlueSeeds took away crucial information from these workshops and the field visit for the development of its WAM project in collaboration with the IUCN:
Assisted natural regeneration
Site hydrology is a determining factor in a project’s ability to restore mangroves. Assisted natural regeneration is to be preferred, as replanting has an 80% failure rate.
Measure of carbon stored underground
The specialists present at the workshops convinced us to measure the carbon present in the soil: an ambitious project.
Looking for financing sources
Fair Carbon will support us in the complex area of markets and finance, to find the right investors and establish fair and ethical rules.
Next steps for our WAM carbon project
Through our partnership with Fair Carbon, our team has acquired all the necessary knowledge to finish the idea incubation phase and develop the WAM project feasibility, considering political, social, economic and ecosystemic aspects.
The next steps are towards the implementation phase, where carbon baseline procedures and training of local stakeholders will take place before the hydrological restoration of the sites.
Find out more about the West African Mangrove (WAM) project.
