Livelihood and ecosystem benefits of carbon credits through rainforests: A case study of Hiniduma Bio-link, Sri Lanka

Abstract

There is growing acceptance that the environmental and livelihood-improvement benefits of forests extend beyond the mitigation of climate change. Forest reforestation programmes that are typically motivated only by carbon benefits also have the potential to improve livelihoods, reduce gender disparities, and provide non-carbon ecosystem benefits with appropriate targeting of land selection and involvement of local communities in governance. The Hiniduma Bio-link Project is owned and maintained by Conservation Carbon Company in Sri Lanka. Apart from the direct benefit of forest protection on decreasing carbon emissions and increasing carbon sequestration, forest projects yield indirect benefits called co-benefits that can be linked to the national agenda of the SDGs and beyond-carbon impacts of forest carbon projects that are often of equal or greater importance to buyers of emissions reductions.Our project, the Hiniduma Bio-link, offers value-added carbon credits for socially and environmentally conscious organisations and individuals. It is a reforestation project to establish a biodiversity corridor between two large protected remnant Sri Lankan rainforest patches – Singharaja and Kanneliya. In addition to mitigating the broader issue of climate change, the project helps to (1) conserve limited rainforest groves by providing buffers and a safe corridor between the two protected forest patches to help reduce threats to local biodiversity and wildlife from adjacent human communities, and (2) improve livelihoods of local farmers and landholders by providing training and income generating opportunities.The Bio-link Project accomplishes this through the reforestation of traditional farmers’ home-gardens in the lowland wet zone region through analog forestry concept. Along with the baseline biomass estimation of the selected pilot phase project, the carbon savings from the newly planted trees were calculated and registered for carbon credits. The expected sequestration potential per hectare is 152.14 t CO2/ha after a 20% deduction for unexpected losses. The ecosystem services provided by the project are sold as Plan Vivo Certificates, which represent long-term carbon sequestration. Crediting period of the project is 15 years. A baseline survey was conducted in each land and the base-load was calculated to be 299.47 tCO2/ha. The certificates registered under the Plan Vivo registry for CO2 sequestrated from the newly planted trees are eligible to be sold as Voluntary Carbon Credits in the international market.The Hiniduma Bio-link Project is also the first project in Asia to complete a Plan Vivo. Plan Vivo is a standard for designing and certifying community based payments for ecosystem services (PES) programmes. One of the noteworthy successes of the project has been the sale of carbon credits from the Hiniduma Bio-link Project to Marks & Spencer, UK.Beyond-carbon impacts of creating just employment or saving habitat for an endangered species are actually the main motivators of the project, and the verified emissions reductions that result are themselves a “co”-benefit – and a means of leveraging carbon finance to implement project activities.