Guatemala Forest Protocol Development

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The Climate Action Reserve is developing a Guatemala Forest Protocol that will focus on the crediting of activities that sequester CO2e from the atmosphere through increasing carbon stocks in trees over time. The Guatemala Forest Protocol will provide project-level eligibility rules, baseline, social and environmental safeguards, methods to calculate net removals of CO2 from the atmosphere due to sequestration activities, procedures to address and compensate for the release of CO2 back to the atmosphere, and measurement, reporting, and verification (MRV) requirements.

Approximately 34% of Guatemala’s territory is covered by forest, making the forest sector key to meeting the country’s climate change goals. Offset credits to be generated under the Guatemala Forest Protocol will incentivize the implementation of additional activities to increase carbon stocks within Guatemala’s forestlands.

Kickoff Webinar

Please join the Reserve for a public webinar to kick-off the Guatemala Forest Protocol development process.

Wednesday, March 29, 2023 (tentative)
11:00 am – 1:00 pm Guatemala time | 10:00 am – 12:00 pm PT
Register here

Local Engagement

The Reserve is seeking interested stakeholders to participate in engagement opportunities to identify and incorporate applicable laws, norms, and conditions from Guatemala as well as specific improvements and changes to ensure the successful adaptation of the Mexico Forest Protocol to Guatemala. All stakeholders interested in the protocol process, please complete the following Local Engagement form below and submit it to [email protected] to help ensure that you receive the appropriate notifications for public engagement opportunities during protocol development.

For stakeholders interested in participating in the protocol development process as workgroup observers:

Workgroup

The Guatemala Forest Protocol will be developed through the Reserve’s multi-stakeholder workgroup process. The Reserve strives to create a well-balanced workgroup consisting of industry representatives, project developers, environmental NGOs, verification bodies, independent consultants, academia, and government bodies.

For stakeholders interested in participating in the protocol development process as workgroup members:

Stakeholders not part of the workgroup are encouraged to participate in the process as “observers.” Observers may attend workgroup meetings in listen-only mode, submit written comments on the draft methodology when it is available for public comment, and attend the public webinar(s) held during the public comment period.

Development Timeline

The following timeline will be updated as the protocol development process unfolds.

Protocol kickoff webinar March 29, 2023
Workgroup SOIs due April 7, 2023
Formation of workgroup April 2023
First workgroup meeting Spring 2023
Second workgroup meeting Summer 2023
Third workgroup meeting Summer 2023
Public comment period Summer 2023
Protocol presented to Reserve Board for approval Fall 2023

Financial Support

Partial funding and technical support for the development of the Guatemala Forest Protocol was provided by MexiCO2 and Istmo Verde.

Please contact the Reserve with questions or comments.