Forest Carbon Projects

ONF International has been helping companies and governments to develop and implement their carbon strategies since 1999. With reforestation projects such as the Fazenda Sao Nicolau in Brazil and on the banks of the Magdalena River in Colombia, as well as REDD projects such as the Huila project in Colombia, ONF International is one of the few players with over 20 years’ proven experience in the field.

ONFI’s carbon projects around the world :

Our key projects

ONF International has a long history of forest carbon projects and was a pioneer in this field in Latin America. ONFI owns and manages a 10,000 hectare estate in Brazil, 2,000 hectares of which have been reforested since 1999 with 2.5 million trees belonging to 50 different native species. This estate, Fazenda Sao Nicolau, is on its third certification and is recognised for the quality of its social and environmental co-benefits, particularly in terms of biodiversity (Verra link).

Its subsidiary ONFA also planted several million trees over 20 years ago to create a forest carbon sink in one of the catchment areas of the Magdalena river in Colombia, using public and private funding (Biocarbon link).

For almost 10 years, ONFA has been developing a grouped REDD project in Huila, with more than 800 beneficiary farmers involved in the project. This project has been developed over an area of 25,000 ha and is located upstream of the Rio Magdalena watershed, forming a corridor between two national parks. Social co-benefits (800 direct beneficiary project partners) and environmental benefits (water resources and biodiversity) are at the heart of the project (Verra link).

The other carbon projects to which ONF International is committed are listed on the map above.

The expertise needed to bring a project to fruition

Developing a plantation or reforestation project to store forest carbon, known as ARR (Afforestation, Reforestation and Revegetation) or REDD+ (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation), is a long and complex process involving several stages, none of which can be neglected. It is necessary to comply with rigorous standards for analysing and documenting carbon benefits, to resolve a range of land tenure, legal, environmental and community relations issues, and to carry out the afforestation or reforestation work and then manage the forest created or recreated over time.

The development of forest carbon projects also requires carbon credits to be quantified using rigorous methodological approaches, developed in a Project Design Document (PDD), independently validated by an external auditor (VVB), and then verified for the issuance of certified carbon credits.

ONF International’s offer

Support for the development of forest carbon projects throughout the entire process: project identification, (pre)feasibility study, preparation of the PDD, technical training of staff, planning of operations, coordination of inventories, support for the implementation of the monitoring system, proposal of innovative data management and monitoring and evaluation solutions (webmapping platform), support for verification as part of the certification of carbon credits, support for the sale of carbon credits thanks to its knowledge of buyers and intermediaries.

Please do not hesitate to contact us for further information on this carbon topic.