Local Private Sector urged to tap into billions in carbon credit opportunities

President of the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCC) Kathy Smith believes that Guyanese businesses can play a much larger role in the country’s environmental protection and conservation efforts, touting the sale of Guyana’s certified carbon credits as one of the many economic opportunities they can capitalise on.

“If we look at the recent agreement…with Hess and the Government, that’s around over US$750 million that can come out from that carbon partnership. So, if the private sector starts to focus on how they can get from the environment while maintaining it; start to look at carbon credits, how we can invest in carbon credits.”

“We are hearing different international organisations that are already purchasing those carbon credits. They’re purchasing those from the Government rather. The Private Sector now can position themselves to be the middleman because we know how to market and we know how to sell. We can now start to purchase from the Government and resell to international organisations,” Smith posited during a special edition of the Starting Point podcast on Wednesday.

Back in November 2022, Guyana became the first country in the world to be issued with Architecture for REDD+ Transactions (ART) TREES certified jurisdictional scale carbon credits, making some 33 million credits available to be sold.

Days later in December 2022, the Guyana Government again made history when it inked the US$750 million multi-year deal with United States (US) energy major Hess Corporation for the sale of 30 per cent of those high-quality carbon credits.

Since then, the country has been able to expand those market opportunities and has earned some US$353 million to date from the sale of its highly certified forest carbon, according to Senior Director of Climate and Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) in the Office of the President, Pradeepa Bholanath, back in June while also appearing on the same podcast.

Included in those earnings are monies also generated from the sale of forest carbons on the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (CORSIA) market – the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO)’s global emissions reduction programme. This was after Guyana was issued with 7.14 million carbon credits in 2024, marking the first time carbon credits have been issued that can be used by airlines in an effort to meet their carbon emission targets for the 2024-2026 period.

In March of this year, Bholanath had revealed that within an 18-month period, Guyana had sold these certified credits to at least 19 airlines through a partnership with the International Air Transport Association (IATA). Earlier in June, it was further reported during IATA’s Annual General Meeting in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, that Guyana is among the top 10 countries around the world that have supplied CORSIA-compatible carbon credits.

In fact, Guyana was listed as the highest supplier with nearly 25 million ART-TREES credits – more than half of the 38 million credits made available on the CORSIA market, with even more airlines expected to purchase Guyana’s high-quality carbon credits over the next two years.

Moreover, Guyana has also sold its high-quality carbon credits to US technology giant Apple Inc. Last year, the tech company purchased some 100,000 credits from Guyana at a cost of almost $314 million as part of its environmental sustainability efforts.

This year, it is projected that the carbon credit inflows would amount to some $49.7 billion for 2026.

With a tropical forest that takes up 86 per cent of its landmass, Guyana has the second-highest percentage forest cover on Earth and one of the lowest deforestation rates. The forest stores 19.5 gigatonnes of carbon and sequesters more than 153 million tonnes annually.

The sale of Guyana’s forest carbon falls under the country’s Low Carbon Development Strategy (LCDS), and according to the GCCI President during Wednesday’s podcast, this strategy – crafted under the Bharrat Jagdeo presidency and expanded by the Irfaan Ali-led Administration – has been guiding the local business sector to pursue economic development in a sustainable manner.

“I think the LCDS has provided a blueprint for the Private Sector as to how we can develop our country while maintaining proper environmental spaces… So, I think the LCDS has been something that has been protecting the environment for a number of years, and it’s about time the Private Sector understands, and we are going after it. We are trying to have the conversation,” she noted.

In fact, Smith noted that the upcoming Global Biodiversity Alliance (GBA) conference that will be held in Georgetown this Friday and Saturday provides a platform for the Guyanese Private Sector to have these talks.

“We need to have more breakout sessions from the summit, not just wait for the yearly summit to come around. I think the Government and Private Sector can start to work to see how we can have different conversations in different spaces to raise that awareness [and] to see how we can start having that conversation strongly and boldly.”

“The same way we are going after oil and gas, the same way we are trying to understand oil and gas, we should start to try to understand our environment, understand our forests, understand our wildlife, understand the different species and see how we can have economic value from them while also ensuring that they’re properly maintained… Our forest is not just there for us to get the lumber out of it only or for land development only. It is now showing us that we can get enormous economic value from our forests while also keeping it intact. So, if we’re to look at the many opportunities, there are new and emerging industries that are coming out, and I feel as a result of the biodiversity summit, we now will have a better understanding as to how we can go after it,” the GCCI President noted.