There are lots of issues with carbon credits. Not least the biggest issue which is that carbon offsetting is not the same as carbon neutrality. Add to that the management of carbon offsetting schemes and other issues include measuring the credits accurately and avoiding double counting. 

But when carbon credit schemes are run by reliable, transparent companies that measure results accurately, they become a powerful tool to change communities and the impact of climate change. Schemes must have community involvement. Project partners have to make sure that the project is sustainable and will be there in the long term, supporting a better future. 

We have worked with Ecotrust for many years. They do valuable work with communities in Uganda to make them more climate resilient, delivering conservation finance ‘where it matters’ to support restoration projects. Their scheme Trees for Global Benefits (TGB) was started in 2003. It is one of the biggest smallholder agro-forestry carbon projects in Africa and it is certified by Plan Vivo. 

Ed Smit, Here Now Films, filmed an interview with Helen in Uganda. She is the community leader of the Ongo Community Land Association in north west Uganda. 

Helen has been working with Ecotrust for 18 years. In that time she has transformed the land from a bare, unsustainable area with no trees, to one where the trees shade coffee and cocoa plants. She also raises livestock who benefit from being in the shade. 

Helen’s trees are now 30 metres high and they provide a home to a troop of chimpanzees that she has named. She tells the interviewer all about the chimps who love to eat the fruit from the trees. 

Helen gets paid once her trees have been inspected. Initially she used her payments for school fees for her children, who are now grown. She is no longer reliant on carbon credit payments in the way that she used to be. 

Ed also filmed Innocent who used to be a poacher, but is now a ‘farmer of carbon’. In the past he was part of a poacher community that worked together. They used their network to avoid being killed by rangers. And clubbed their funds together to pay bail when they were arrested. 

Now he patrols his forests to stop the poachers. And he runs the local farmer carbon collective. The funding from the carbon credits has allowed the collective to start beekeeping and to build water tanks so that the women no longer have to walk to fetch water. 

Using the carbon credit money they grow eucalyptus trees and sell felled timber to a local tea plantation for profit. They have paid for their children to go to school and set up a community finance fund. When managed like this, carbon credits, together with sustainable land management and conservation education can change lives and communities.

Ecotrust works in three areas in Uganda: Queen Elizabeth National Park, Murchison-Semliki and Mount Elgon where our coffee comes from. We are proud to support them and see the benefits to the local farming communities. 

We believe that carbon credit projects, when done right, provide an impetus for farmers to work their land more sustainably. We decided to support Plan Vivo, because they worked with smallholder farmers who wanted to create sustainable livelihoods. The programmes encourage them to plant trees instead of clearing forest which not only benefits biodiversity but is also beneficial to their coffee crops.