The country plans to create 187 million carbon credits and intends to resell half of them on the offset market. Indeed, the sale of 90 million carbon credits on the offset market should enable the Central African country, whose territory is 88% covered by tropical rainforest, to garner 291 million dollars. For Gabon, “forests” rhymes with “economic opportunities”.
To this end, the Gabonese Minister of the Environment announced that Gabon is preparing to create 187 million carbon credits, of which 90 million will be sold on the offset market before the United Nations Conference on Climate Change (COP 27 ), scheduled for next November in Egypt.
“Carbon credits will likely hit the market just before COP 27 in Egypt. 90 million will be sold on the offset market, and the balance will be processed through a non-market mechanism,” Lee White said at the Commonwealth Summit in Rwanda from June 20-26, 2022.
Currently, according to indications from the Gabonese minister, the market price is 10 dollars on average per carbon credit. But this value can fluctuate depending on the type of project, its size, its location, its implementation methodology, and especially supply and demand.
According to him, this operation represents the largest emission of carbon credits on a global scale.
According to calculations by Allied Offsets, a provider of data on carbon offsets, the monetization of 90 million carbon credits envisaged by Gabon should enable the country to collect $291 million.
“Carbon credits will likely hit the market just before the UN Climate Change Conference (COP27) scheduled for November in Egypt. Ninety million will be sold and non-market mechanisms will be used for the balance”, declared the Minister of the Environment.
According to him, the Gabonese government is working with the REDD+ mechanism of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change to create these carbon credits, which are tokens representing one ton of carbon dioxide which warms the climate and which is reduced , removed or not added to the atmosphere. Companies use them to offset their own emissions. They can be traded on the international market for instruments or companies can invest in projects to produce them themselves.
Gabon’s forests are part of the Congo Basin, the second largest rainforest in the world following the Amazon. The Central African country, which is seeking to diversify its economy away from hydrocarbons, was the first on the continent to receive funds intended to protect the capacity of its forests to absorb carbon. 17 million dollars were indeed paid to the Gabonese State in June 2021 by the Central African Forest Initiative, supported by several European governments.
“Forest conservation is almost a moral responsibility, and a matter of national security,” Mr. White said, quoted by Bloomberg, recalling that the Congo Basin forest favors rainfall in the Sahel region of Ethiopia and the United Kingdom. -of the.
A carbon credit (or offset credit) is a unit of measurement corresponding to one tonne of carbon dioxide (CO2) that has been avoided or absorbed.
When a company wishes to offset its emissions, it acquires the number of carbon credits corresponding to the volume of its greenhouse gas emissions. The main buyers of these credits are carbon funds, industrial investors, with financial intermediaries (mainly banks) and companies operating in the energy sector.
Moctar FICOU / VivAfrik