The article is on Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) carbon forestry projects in the Philippines for land management, adaptation to climate variability to secure food sources, and securing additional income for local community. The Tanay Rehabilitation Carbon Project of Laguna de Bay Community Wastershed has been under development for more than three years. The design and implementation of this project is supported by World Bank and involves establishment and management of 52 hectares of forest, consisting of pure forest plantation and agroforesrry areas. The project has signed an emission reduction purchase agreement with the Bank and for 20 years of project period, it will have total net carbon benefits of 20,800 tCO2-e with an estimated value of approximately USD 140,000 at USD 5/tCO2-e benefiting the local farmers and community through employment opportunity, environmental protection and additional income.
In 2003, The Kalahan Forestry Carbon project in northern Luzon was selected as a pilot site by ICRAF , Rewarding Upland Poor for Environmental Services (RUPES) to develop carbon sequestration payment mechanism. ICRAF facilitated the community and Japanese Buyer where the buyer agreed to pay cost of registration and validation of project and to buy the credits at agreed price of USD 8/ tCO2-e. The project is targeting two types of carbon market: 1. Voluntary Carbon Market, with an aim to convert 900 ha of marginal and abandoned agriculture land to more productive tree based systems, and 2. Voluntary Carbon Offset market , in order to maintain 10,000 ha of secondary forest for production forest and carbonsequestrastion.
Lessons Learnt:
- Appropriate governmental institutions should be selected to identify eligible land for projects.
- Link local project developers to potential buyers, and
- Directly involve local community.
