Sustainable soil management promotes sequestration of carbon from the atmosphere
German NGO Stiftung Lebensraum, agricultural cooperative Raiffeisen Waren-Zentrale Rhein-Main eG and First Climate jointly announce the initiation of a joint venture. The aim of the “KlimaHumus” initiative is to support sustainable soil management in agriculture by promoting humus build-up.
To this end, the new initiative offers trainings and educational programs for knowledge transfer to enable actors in the agricultural sector to work towards increased humus formation. The aim is to enable the long-term storage of carbon.
Konstantin Pauly, designated managing director of the joint venture, is convinced of the project’s effectiveness: “Together with all participating farmers, the KlimaHumus initiative will make its contribution to regional and effective carbon storage. Imparting the necessary knowledge about regenerative agriculture is understood here as an educational mission and is an important component of the program.”
Attractive offer for farmers and companies willing to compensate
With the help of measures for improved soil management, which are imparted through training courses, humus build-up can be improved. The measures also improve general soil health and carbon is thus significantly sequestered from the atmosphere – one of the few ways to store carbon in the long term. Based on soil analyses before and after the application of humus-enhancing measures, the carbon sink performance will be calculated and can eventually be traded as a KlimaHumus certificate. Companies wishing to make a commitment to climate protection can purchase the certificates through the joint venture and in this way compensate for their unavoidable greenhouse gas emissions.
Joint venture partners
The KlimaHumus joint venture acts as a link between companies willing to compensate and farmers who want to implement respective measures on their agricultural land. The three joint venture partners work closely together within the framework of the initiative.
In the context of the joint initiative, the Stiftung Lebensraum will operate the “Kompetenzzentrum Boden und regenerative Landnutzung” (engl. “Competence Center Soil and Regenerative Land Use”), which, in addition to networking, research and development, will also offer practical training for soil users throughout Germany in the future.
Raiffeisen Waren-Zentrale Rhein-Main eG (RWZ) will provide participating farmers with the equipment, resources and know-how that is necessary to implement the measures.
First Climate will quantify the achieved carbon reduction performance according to recognized methods and have it certified by independent third party auditors. The company will also make the resulting certificates accessible to clients in the voluntary carbon market, who will use them to compensate for their unavoidable greenhouse gas emissions. Urs Brodmann, CEO of First Climate (Switzerland) AG and member of the joint venture’s board of directors, explains: “Compensating for unavoidable emissions is an essential part of corporate climate protection strategies these days. Certificates from the build-up of soil carbon are particularly popular in the market because they are in line with the long-term, global net-zero target of the Paris Agreement.”
