Lake Victoria Carbon Project Will Deliver 4 Million+ VCUs

Trees for the Future’s (TREES) Lake Victoria Carbon Project is made up of 17,000 Forest Gardens and will deliver over 4 million Verified Carbon Units (VCUs) over the life of the project. The first-of-its-kind project is funded by Catona Climate. The high-impact climate finance company announced their $21 million investment in TREES in 2023.

This investment has allowed TREES to engage at the landscape level, designing a program that works across the Lake Victoria Watershed in Kenya. This comprehensive approach to restoration promotes the protection and enhancement of biodiversity across the watershed’s ecosystem and has deepened stakeholder engagement with municipalities, counties, and national counterparts.

This program has transformed TREES’ farmer partnerships, moving from four-year projects to a contract-based engagement over 25 years. Smallholder farmers can now add carbon as a crop in their diversified Forest Gardens. Participating farmers will receive a share of carbon credit profits in addition to the ongoing benefits of food security, household nutrition, and income provided through the Forest Garden Approach.

Since its founding in 1989, TREES has planted over 344 million trees with farming communities around the world. The farmers in this project are located in Homa Bay, Kisumu, and Migori Counties and make up 30% of the farmers TREES has served. Through their “Forest Garden Approach,” TREES teaches farmers to transform their land with thousands of fast-growing, ecologically appropriate trees and dozens of other crops, creating new possibilities for themselves and their communities. The average Forest Garden in this project will be made up of 5,800 trees per hectare on average.