According to a report by Bloomberg, the project generated more than $100 million in revenue after being set up over a decade ago by South Pole, a major Swiss carbon credits broker, and CGI, which is run by a Zimbabwean businessman. South Pole walked away from Kariba in late 2023 when Verra suspended the project and began an internal review following an investigation by The New Yorker magazine.

Nearly two years later, Verra announced last week that its review had found 57% of Kariba’s nearly 27 million credits were issued “in excess”. That is because the actual deforestation observed in a reference area chosen by Kariba’s project developers to predict how much CO2 the scheme would conserve was “significantly lower” than initially estimated, Verra said.

The value of promises.

Its promising that there is some auditing of the carbon credits happening. This will help the health of the programs.