Our view of the report on the commitment of Lichtenauer & Co. in Peru
A new factual report by ARD, which appeared at the beginning of January, takes a critical look at the environmental protection commitment of some large German and international companies such as Lichtenauer and Shell with official CO2 certificates from Peru.
The report has no connection to us. But it is about nature conservation in the Madre de Dios region along the Tambopata River, which is exactly the area where we are also committed to the rainforest. It takes a very critical look at (mainly international) commitment to the forest and cooperation with the people in the region.
We would therefore like to proactively take the opportunity to explain our perspective. We want to show that concrete, effective and transparent engagement is definitely possible in this region.
Part 1: Lichtenauer & CO2 certificates from Peru
Lichtenauer is committed to forest protection in Madre de Dios and has purchased CO2 certificates from Brazil nut concessions there via ClimatePartner, which in turn are sold by the company "Bosques Amazónicos".
The area "La Pampa" was chosen by the certifier VERRA as a reference area, which now resembles a lunar landscape due to numerous illegal mines. The criticism is that this area is not suitable as a reference for the suspected deforestation on the area of the Brazil nut concession.
The accusation is that too many CO2 certificates were created as a result and that Lichtenauer is therefore engaging in greenwashing. In addition, the local Brazil nut concessionaires lack support against illegal invasions, meaning that the area is not being adequately protected as promised. The company Bosques Amazónicos, which sells the certificates, was not responsive.
What we do differently
We protect forests through legally secure purchase with entry in the land register, and in the long term. CO2 certificates only protect forests for 30 years as part of a concession.
Every donation has a concrete impact: one euro donation protects one square meter of forest.
Thanks to geocoordinates, it is easy to see where it is located.
Local forest guardian ensure the daily protection of the areas and support the research work.
We are currently investing heavily in agroforestry projects with the people of the region.
These are being implemented together with Camino Verde and Salomon Perez' farm "Fundo Ten Paciencia" in the areas adjacent to our protected areas, for example with the Montegrande Community.These projects are not only an important investment in long-term forest protection in the form of environmental education, but above all they create jobs and enable people to earn a sustainable living.
However, they are still in the initial phase because we have only been actively involved in Peru since 2021 and it takes time to establish contacts and build up quality cooperation.
We do not issue official certificates because we think the system is bad in principle.
The most fundamental problem with the certificates is that they are awarded for forest concessions. These are limited to a maximum of 30 years. After that, a new decision is made on what happens to the forest area. There is therefore no guarantee of long-term protection for ecosystems that are thousands of years old. Secondly, the certificates can be traded on the international market.
The numerous companies involved, which resell the certificates, earn a lot of money. Little money, on the other hand, goes to the people who actually protect the forest on a daily basis with their practical work. In addition, as in the example of Lichtenauer, there are so many middlemen involved between those who protect the concession and those who ultimately buy the certificates that it is difficult to understand which projects really work well.
We have already considered the possibility of issuing official CO2 certificates with a twist: In this way, we wanted to make it possible for companies that need these certificates to donate to us. At the same time, however, we only wanted to sell the certificates directly and only for their actual price, i.e. only cover the costs we had with the certification. In addition, the certificates should only be available in connection with the mandatory support of our core project: So for 1 tonne of CO2 certificate from a concession, there should always also be 17 m2 of permanently and legally purchased and protected rainforest with a land register entry.
To this end, we have been working intensively with Verra and the certification process and are finding more and more errors in it. In particular, we find the logic breaks in the reference areas unacceptable. We will not be pursuing this project with Verra any further.
Part 2: Greenwashing by Shell
In the second part, the report also criticizes a Shell nature conservation project in the Cordillera Azul, where 1.6 million hectares of rainforest are to be preserved. The local population should be better off. The journalists were unable to find out where or how exactly the forest is being protected and the people are being supported.
As far as the history of the area is concerned, however, they find out that a state nature reserve was established, which was then handed over to an NGO for management, which entered into the certificate trade. However, at least five families are said to have been evicted from their land when the reserve was established. The general criticism here is that the local population, some of whom are indigenous, who have been protecting the area for hundreds of years and have contributed the least to climate change, benefit the least from certificate trading and even suffer from it.
What we do differently
We are not concerned with people or forests, but with how the two can function together. There has been a highly functional coexistence between humans and the forests in this region of the Amazon for many thousands of years because they knew how to deal with the ecosystem (e.g. through terra preta) without destroying it. Accordingly, there is a history of settlement dating back thousands of years, until European demands for profit maximization through resource extraction of wood, gold, etc. destroyed the ecosystem. In addition, many diseases were introduced by the settlers, resulting in the death of large parts of the population in many regions and the loss of much of the knowledge and skills of the oral cultures.
We do not evict anyone for our conservation area. We acquire pieces of land that are for sale by the owners and on which no one lives permanently. In most cases, people are happy to give their beloved forest, where they grew up, into firm local and international hands so that it is permanently protected.
In addition, some owners would like to continue using the area for sustainable activities such as soft ecotourism after the sale. We then enter into partnerships, for example with Wasai Lodge. Sometimes we only buy the intact forest on the property and the previous owners take part in agroforestry projects with the remaining area. We also offer jobs for forest guardian and in research.
Many topics in one report?
We have to say: We are somewhat disappointed with the quality of the report on German First Television. Instead of in-depth expert research on a specific aspect, three major topics (CO2 certificate trading, corporate greenwashing and the treatment of people in the project areas) are dealt with here in 45 minutes. An ambivalent view is missing, so that in the end the impression can easily arise that there is or can be no reasonable commitment to nature conservation in Peru.
The real problem
In our opinion, the problem with the specific projects mentioned in the report lies more with those involved, such as ClimatePartner, who in many cases have "marketed" inadequate projects. But it also lies in the fact that the companies often don't ask enough questions or don't have good standards.
We believe that companies need to make better inquiries and look at the projects themselves on site before they commit to them.
We recommend checking the following points, among others:
- For how long is protection guaranteed? Is the project designed to be as long-term as possible?
- How does the organization make the transparency of the donation visible? Is it shown exactly where the protected forest is located?
- What indicators of concrete effectiveness are mentioned?
- What possibilities are given to me to assure myself of the quality of the work?
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Madre de Dios
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