2025 Community Assembly

Toward a Sustainable and Green Local Economy

On Monday, March 3, we held a special community meeting to discuss the distribution of Gold Standard carbon credits. The meeting brought together 150 participants representing all the villages where Faja Lobi is carrying out reforestation efforts, in the presence of the forestry administrator, the police colonel, the ANR, and the DGM. The meeting was lively: we took the time to answer numerous questions and explain how the carbon credits will be distributed.

The residents now understand even better that reforestation is in their best interest. Every three years for 40 years, carbon credit certificates will generate revenue (by the time I’m 92…). This gives our forest time to grow and provides the community with funds to develop its economy. Faja Lobi will support them in building a sustainable economy through cooperatives: that’s what makes the project sustainable.

What makes Faja Lobi unique is that 100% of the profits from carbon credits—after deducting costs—are invested back into the community. Elsewhere, most of the profits go to the project developer.

Here, 20% goes to the village to fund community infrastructure: streetlights, health centers, school buildings, wells, flour mills, etc. 60% is invested in establishing an agricultural economy and a processing industry, which the residents will choose themselves and manage step by step through their cooperatives, with support from Faja Lobi. 10% remains with Faja Lobi to create firebreaks, which provide direct employment for the village residents, and 10% is used to manage and monitor the entire project.

Last week, the Ministry of the Environment visited us for five days to approve the project. Its representatives told us, verbatim: “You’re thinking outside the box. Here, everything goes to the local communities: you’re driving real regional development!” So we also hope that European citizens will be willing to pay a little more for our carbon credits, because the more revenue they generate, the more regional development progresses. And for the local population, one thing was crystal clear: whoever burns their forest today is destroying their own future!

The carbon credit project will be implemented with the expertise of CO2logic. In addition to this key point, a second resolution was adopted: when villages or clans disagree—for example, over land rights—they will continue to work on the project and resolve their differences peacefully among themselves. The party to whom the land belongs will be entitled to its share of the carbon credits. But the Faja Lobi project must protect every participant at all times, because their forest is their bank.

We hope that, by the end of this year, next year's budgets will be available.