Verra, a leading standards setter for the voluntary carbon market, announced earlier this week that it has completed a thorough review of the Southern Cardamom REDD+ Project in Cambodia and taken the project off hold in the Verra Registry.
The 450,000-hectare project produced carbon credits, purchased by companies to compensate for their emissions, by preserving forestland that was claimed to be at risk of deforestation.
Verra’s review began in June 2023 following allegations by Human Rights Watch of harrasment and forced evictions of residents living near the forest protected by the scheme.
The organization has concluded its review of all project audits and has concluded that the project’s authorized representative, Wildlife Alliance, has demonstrated the necessary actions to address all alleged damages and has set up measure to mitigate the risk of future harm.
The project is now active in all three programs in which it is registered: the Verified Carbon Standard (VCS) Program, the Climate, Community & Biodiversity Standards (CCBS) Program, and the Sustainable Development Verified Impact Standard (SD VISta) Program.
During the review process, Wildlife Alliance took several steps such as enhancing its human rights policies by incorporating principles from the UN and improving its approach to indigenous rights. It also developed a new Values and Ethics Policy, updated its stakeholder consultation process to allow for anonymous voting, and provided extensive training on these revised guidelines.
Additionally, the organization introduced new procedures for grievance handling, hired a Conservation Communication Officer, and set up operational guidelines to enforce Cambodia’s environmental laws, with plans to submit a progress report in 2025.
Luciana Tellez Chavez, lead author of HRW’s initial report on the Southern Cardamom project, criticized Verra’s review as deeply insufficient.
She argued that Verra failed to engage with the individuals affected by the project, highlighting a significant oversight in their process. “Verra didn’t interview a single victim of this project,” said Tellez Chavez, HRW senior researcher on environment and human rights. “Their report has no independent findings: it simply restates the assertions of the Wildlife Alliance that they don’t think they did anything wrong,” she told AFP.
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