Offset Your Emissions: High Atlas Carbon Solution

Morocco’s Need for Trees

According to Morocco’s Ministry of Agriculture, one billion fruit trees and billions of medicinal plants are needed as one of several essential contributions in order to overcome poverty in rural areas, which afflicts approximately 80 percent of its people. In addition, drylands cover 97 percent of Moroccan land, being one of the world's best long-term carbon sinks it requires immediate action to halt irreversible degradation of soils.

Obstacle to Transition

Farming families in Morocco are economically compelled to transition toward fruit tree agriculture and away from traditionally growing barley and corn. These staple crops are currently cultivated on 70 percent of agricultural land, yet only generate 10 to 15 percent of agricultural revenue. To address this obstacle to sustainable livelihoods, rural communities must build nurseries to grow from seeds the fruit trees and medicinal plants they need to cultivate in their localities. However, farming households cannot dedicate their land to build nurseries because their survival requires sowing and harvesting every year. Therefore, the in-kind contribution of land for people’s nurseries is vital to meet the demand for trees of rural families.

Partners for Land In-Kind

The High Atlas Foundation (HAF) receives land lent in-kind for the nurseries of farming communities from government agencies, universities, and civil groups, including the High Commission of Waters and Forests, the Ministry of Culture, Youth, and Sports, the Ministry of Education and Professional Development, University Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah in Fes, Al Akhawayn University in Ifrane, the Moroccan Jewish community, and cooperatives.

HAF Nurseries: Millions of Trees

Currently the High Atlas Foundation manages twelve tree nurseries in seven provinces of Morocco. At maximum capacity, they can currently grow 1.6 million organic fruit saplings grown from native seeds. In addition to these twelve locations of community-managed nurseries, the High Atlas Foundation has also been lent land without cost from the above agencies to build 13 new nurseries of relatively large size, that if planted to their capacities, includes the generation of approximately 10 million trees per year.

Carbon Sequestration

Based on HAF calculations in consultation with carbon offset experts, the planting of 10 million fruit trees will generate approximately 425,000 verified carbon units (VCUs). To secure these units, monetize their value, and account for their CO2 offset benefit, the trees require monitoring twice during the first five years. While VCU’s are usually stored up to 150 years in living trees, due to the unique climatic conditions of Morocco, carbon is transformed into stabilized hummus, remaining in the soil for up to 1,000 years. HAF commits to sustainable long-term carbon storage, providing the wrap-around service of constructing and maintaining the nurseries, transplanting them with farming families, cooperatives, and education centers, while monitoring
and registering the data. Ten million trees impact approximately 40,000 rural households, including 200,000 people, while cooling the climate globally.

Low Cost Offsets

HAF is able to provide tree planting, monitoring, and the required data to secure CO2 offsets at the low cost of $0.55 per tree due to these contributing factors:

1. We grow the saplings from seeds, which allows us to retain significant value, spending only 16 to 25 percent of the private sector price per tree, depending on the variety.

2. The lending of free land by public and civil agencies further reduces costs and price-per-tree unit.

3. The utilization of local fruit seed varieties not only significantly enhances biodiversity, but enables seed procurement in close proximity to the nurseries, reducing transportation costs and increasing survival rates.

4. Nurseries are maintained by local community members who receive from the HAF a fair salary plus benefits, including health insurance and social security, with seasonal workers also coming from the neighboring vicinity. Thus, labor costs are relatively modest with a high level of commitment and satisfaction.

5. Finally, the trees are distributed to the farmers, where capacity building workshops on effective tree planting and care play a key role in maintaining the HAF’s outstanding tree survival rate. Farmers pay $0.20 per tree, and the entirety of that amount is reinvested in seeds in order to replenish the nurseries, provide for their caretaking, and continue the generation of young trees for subsequent years.

Created in the 1980s, carbon offsets refer to the sequestering or removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to subtract from industrial and personal total emissions. Different techniques (of which tree planting is the most popular) are used to produce carbon offset credits, a purchasable equivalent of 1 metric tonne of removed carbon dioxide.

The offset market has recently gained overwhelming global support as social movements drive more industries and governments to address climate change directly. Despite its popularity, there is no strong international government oversight of the carbon offset market, leading to complexities in evaluating the effectiveness of this economic and environmental practice.

More so, lack of regulation allows actors within this market to create misleading offset claims to increase financial benefits that add –rather than decrease– net emissions. As such, the public and private spheres must take rapid steps to specifically characterize the offset market's realistic impact on the current climate emergency.

Carbon offsets are produced through several different methods. However, researchers widely agreed that credits must be created through environmentally friendly actions that would not exist without the new financing. The most popular method of producing carbon offsets is trees, either planting saplings or protecting forests.

Planting trees is a non-localized solution to carbon emissions. This method of carbon sequestering operates on the basis that all greenhouse gasses (GHG) produced enter a global atmosphere, so planting trees anywhere equally impacts the atmosphere.

A single adult tree will sequester about 1 tonne of carbon every 50 years, and the going rate for carbon credit is USD 7. Tree saplings cost as little as 20 cents, leaving a significant profit to support the infrastructure and expansion of green businesses. Often nonprofits use this monetary surplus to provide fruit-bearing or environmentally beneficial trees to underserved communities.

Beyond tree planting initiatives, carbon offsets confer direct economic value to living forests, providing monetary protections for these resources. Regrettably, despite the positive benefits of tree planting, trees cannot sustain a practical solution to GHG emissions short of massive afforestation of the world’s livable land.

The pitfalls of carbon offsets lie in the lack of industry regulations. Carbon offsets are sustained through two markets: compliance and voluntary. Buyers in these markets must purchase credits in compliance with regulations or act with autonomy to buy credits seeking indirect financial benefits. Ideally, carbon offsets should only target emissions that cannot be removed by other routes.

Instead, carbon credits are often used to raise the total emission cap of a corporation. Even with providers of offsets, there is large variability in the standards of credits- cheap credits are often low quality. Several private, global organizations exist with respected standards to certify carbon offset sources.

They, however, have a fee that makes them less accessible to smaller organizations. Even between these major groups, there are disagreements on standards. The biggest criteria is proof that an offset project could not exist without selling the credits. Companies often get around this standard due to a lack of strict regulations.

Private organizations sell carbon offsets from pre-existing and protected forests. As such, many carbon credits do not indicate new GHG removed from the atmosphere. Even within the developing world, carbon offsets are praised for playing positive roles in developing countries by supporting tree planting and forest protection. At the same time, they often serve to reward the carbon emissions of source nations inadvertently.

The low cost of carbon credits also presents barriers to green initiatives. Carbon offsets remain much more affordable than other methods of carbon removal or transitions to green energy sources. However, tree carbon offsets (like trees) are a temporary solution to global emissions.

The sequestered carbon will eventually return to the environment with the tree’s dead resources. Misleading carbon offsets inundate consumer and private markers, giving the public a false impression of reduced emissions as this short-term solution takes precedent in global markets. The global atmosphere suffers as a result.

Carbon offsets are an essential component of combating climate change, yet they are far from a global miracle drug. The policy is responding to the negative lack of regulation within carbon markets, ensuring in the future, only legitimate carbon sequestering projects can operate. Within the coming years, carbon providers can expect to face stricter rules for credit certification and a more wary buying pool.

To address these changes, tree planting organizations should work to ensure their credits meet the guidelines defined by international groups like the Kyoto Protocol Clean Development Mechanism or Gold Standard, which are major players in creating new policies.

They should prepare sustainable business models based on increased costs of carbon offsets and changes in demand as the industry is forced to employ various sustainable practices. Increased regulation will ensure the positive impact of carbon credit tree-based organizations as active warriors against the climate crisis.