Anantapur Farm Forestry Project
Climate Team
FCN facilitated Accion Fraterna, a grassroots NGO with longstanding presence in Anantapur district, develop and register a Biogas CDM Project in January 2012, with the UNFCC and Gold Standard.
As per our normal practice, FCN first made concerted efforts to build a proficient climate team in Anantapur, comprising 5-6 Case Workers and over 100 village volunteers. We first held an intensive 11-day long training session on climate science, climate change and the offsetting mechanism. They were then taught technical sills like taking waypoints and delineating discrete plots, making shape files, biogas construction, etc.
They also internalised the value of FCN standards spelt out here, as a vital prerequisite to ensure the success of climate projects. They realised that without total and exception-free transparency, commitment to carbon revenue sharing, instilling management capacity, emphasis on women, etc. the effort would just be another temporary self-serving project.
CDM Projects
Biogas CDM
Two years later, in October 2014, under an ERPA with InterGlobe Aviation (IndiGo), FCN facilitated the implementation of this project. See project details here.
3,459 Biogas units were built for as many women in 169 villages. After 10 years, functionality is still high at 91% due to continuous and intimate contact, as well as efficient monitoring and repair. A total of 84,452 tonnes of Greenhouse Gases have been avoided by not burning biomass in conventional chullas.
The ERPA with IndiGo is nearing completion with 82% of committed CERs delivered. Post-ERPA, in the 3rd and final commitment period, emission reductions made will continue to be verified, issued, sold/compensated, and carbon revenue distrusted to End User women in proportion to their actual usage.
Woodstoves CDM
Meanwhile, informed discussions in the villages increased climate awareness not just in Biogas End Users, but in all the poor in 169 villages. Village meetings observed that domestic Biogas benefits only the slightly better off families who owned cows and had space near their kitchens.
They requested us to explore other technologies that could serve extremely poor families who could not afford to even refill their government subsidised LPG cylinders. Though not as energy efficient as Biogas, FCN opted for improved cookstoves (ICS) which would reduce biomass usage by at least 40-50%.
In February 2022, FCN registered the second CDM project for Anantapur and, with our own resources (i.e. without any forward sale of carbon credits through any ERPA). We gave out 5,739 fuel-efficient Woodstoves to as many End User women. This project is proceeding very well. The 1st Verification is underway and Gold Standard will issue 16,240 GS VERs in the coming months.
When sold in the voluntary market @ € 13 per tonne, we should realise ₹ 1.9 crore. Each End User woman will receive a carbon revenue of ₹ 3,300 for the valuable environmental service she has provided to society at large, over and above partially solving her practical gender problem.
Afforestation/Reforestation CDM (Farm Forestry)
As a next step, the climate team asked if FCN could help families shift from risky and rain dependent field crops to tree cropping. Their exposure to ADATS, Bagepalli, had convinced them that Farm Forestry was an ideal intervention in similar semi-arid drought prone regions.
FCN realised that such a combination of energy and land-use climate projects constitutes an integrated strategy for strengthening the climate resilience of these drought affected communities.
In the first half of 2023, there were intense discussions in all the villages. Biogas and Woodstoves End User women themselves selected participating farmers after assessing interest, capability, and water availability. Case Workers visited their fields, recorded baseline (the few trees already present), and delineated discrete plots. The FCN Desk Worker entered data and waypoints into the Tristle Polygon Recorder and generated shape files.
In June 2023, we started the formal process to register a Farm Forestry (A/R CDM) project for Anantapur with a hugely attended stakeholders meeting. The salient features are as under:
| Project Proponents | Fair Climate Services Pvt Ltd & ADATS, Bagepalli |
| Project Title | "GS12323: VPA-02 under the Afforestation & Reforestation Project GS4GG PoA 11857: Forests, Trees & Sustainable Livelihoods" |
| GS Project Design Document (VPADD) | https://platform.sustain-cert.com/public-project/3570 |
| Project Acres | 5,585 |
| Discrete Plots | 1,611 |
| Participating Farmer Families | 1,436 in 96 villages |
Budget
| Activity Processes | Cost | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| A. | VPA Registration | 10,85,000 | 1% |
| B. | Preparing for Community Participation & Ownership | Completed | |
| C. | Selection of Participating Families; Delineating 2,900 acres / 1,020 Discrete Plots | Completed | |
| D. | Field Preparation & Planting Plans for each Discrete Plot (through MG-NREGA) | - | |
| E. | Planting Saplings & Annual Replacement | 4,59,00,000 | 62% |
| F. | Monitoring Tree Growth | 67,43,650 | 9% |
| G. | Verification & Issuance of Forestry Credits | 31,42,000 | 2% |
| H. | Staff & Admin Costs | 85,34,048 | 11% |
| I. | Capital Costs | 7,20,000 | 1% |
| J. | 10% FCN Handling Charges + 18% GST | 80,88,140 | 11% |
| TOTAL | ₹ 7,42,12,837 | 100% | |
Projected Returns
As per the project design document (PDD) registered with Gold Standard, and our extensive experience with Afforestation/Reforestation, a conservative estimate of returns from this project is as under:
| PDD Value | 60,000 | GS VERs |
| 1st Verification (reduced to 85% survival rate) | 51,000 | GS VERs |
| LESS: 20% Buffer retained by Gold Standard | 10,200 | GS VERs |
| ISSUANCE in 2028 | 40,800 | GS VERs |
| Current voluntary market price: (will be higher, 5 years hence) | € 20 | ₹ 1,800 |
| Carbon Revenue: | ₹ 7,34,40,000 | |
| 70% to 930 Participating Farmers (as per End User Agreements) | ₹ 5,14,08,000 | |
| Carbon Revenue earned by each Participating Farmer family | ₹ 55,277 | |
| 30% retained to meet Monitoring, Verification and Issuance expenses in the next 5 years: | ₹ 2,20,32,000 | |
| Projection of 2028-2032 Requirement (10% over and above current budget) | ₹ 2,10,53,667 | |
Current Progress
Project implementation has already started from July 2023 with our limited resources and borrowed moneys, and the below targets:
| Saplings to be Planted over 3 years | 4,50,000 |
| Saplings Replaced | 90,000 |
- 715 farmer families from 63 villages have planted 3,99,596 saplings on 3,274 acres.
- Survival Rate, after one years, is 94%.
- 25% of the landowners are women and 75% men.
- Due to the availability of irrigation facilities, only 6% of participating families are SC/ST. Backward Castes comprise 94%.
- 57% own less than 3 acres, 33% own 3 to 5 acres, and 18% own more than 5 acres.
- They have planted 15 species, including Mango, Guava, Custard Apple, sweet lime (Musambi) and Pomegranate. They have also planted Mahogany, Red Sanders and Teak on the borders of their plots.