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Land Use and Forestry (LUF) projects

Land Use and Forestry (LUF) Projects

All LUF Projects must follow the Gold Standard for the Global Goals Principles and Requirements, the Stakeholder Consultation and Engagement Requirements, the Safeguarding Principles & Requirements, and the Gender Policy.

All LUF Projects must also follow the Land-use & Forests Activity Requirements. Each project goes through a process that we refer to as the “GS project cycle.”

GS Project Cycle Diagram

GS Project Development Elements

New GS project development elements include but are not limited to:
  1. Project design 
  2. Stakeholder consultation
  3. Preliminary review period
  4. Validation and Verification Body (VVB) validation. 
All Standard documents, including Template reporting documents, can be found on the GS4GG document website. 

Microscale LUF Projects 

LUF projects are divided into two: Forestry and Agriculture. To be defined as microscale the following requirements must be met under the Smallholder, small scale and microscale definitions and requirements for Land-Use and Forestry (LUF) projects – Gold Standard for the Global Goals:
  1. A microscale project is defined as a project with a maximum project area of 500ha.
  2. A microscale project shall not generate more than 10,000 tCO2e/yr.
  3. If a microscale project generates more than 10,000 tCO2e in any monitoring year, the project issuance will be capped to 10,000 tCO2e. A monitoring year may be covered under two or more consecutive monitoring reports. 
  4. A microscale project applying LUF activity requirements may apply provisions of validation and verification as per Micro-scale Project Requirements. 
LUF Projects can only be certified if their identified activity is eligible under an approved Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) Impact Quantification methodology. 

Note: This new Rule Update overrides LUF Activity Requirements.

Assistance in the development of Land Use and Forestry (LUF) Projects

To avoid conflicts of interest, SustainCERT does not consult or assist in the development of LUF Projects, SC only aids in auditing the certification process. Gold Standard (GS), as the standards body, also does not consult in development of LUF projects. There are separate advisory firms that project developers can hire for assistance in project development. GS/SC can only guide and clarify rules or help project developers understand the requirements.

New Area Certification for Land Use and Forestry

New Area Certification involves the process of adding or reducing areas into a registered Gold Standard project. New areas are project areas that are added to (or removed from) a Gold Standard existing project after it achieves Registered Status (after the design certification) and you can indicate potential New Areas in the initial project design by identifying it in the Project Design Document (PDD) and indicate areas of future project growth through new area certifications.

*New Area Certification applies only to land use and forest projects, see Land Use and Forests (LUF) Activity Requirements Version 1.2.1, section 2.1.15. 

Requirements to remove or reduce a project area

According to LUF Activity Requirements 2.1.16, a project developer shall consult with Gold Standard before removing a certified area and/or reducing the size of a certified area, in order to assess the materiality of the changes.
  1. The inclusion of new areas shall follow the Project Design Certification process as per Principles and Requirements.
  2. The Project Developer should assess if the new areas present material differences from the Design Certified project and update the Safeguarding Principles & Requirements accordingly. Materiality must be assessed according to Principles and Requirements.
  3. For new areas proposed for inclusion, the crediting period end date will be the same as for the previously Design Certified project activity.
  4. The registered Monitoring & Reporting Plan template shall be updated with the information for new areas as needed.
According to LUF Activity requirements 2.1.17 a site visit and an opinion by a VVB is required to confirm the eligibility of the proposed activities in the new areas. New Areas inclusion can be certified before or during a performance certification, but it is always required to have the opinion of a VVB based on a site visit to the new area/s being certified. 

​Retroactive Projects

Under LUF Activity Requirements 2.1.18, New areas added to retroactive projects must follow the requirements for retroactive issuance as per the Principles and Requirements, GHG Emissions Reductions & Sequestration Product Requirements, and the Requirements stated in this document.

Gold Standard does not certify projects that avoid deforestation such as REDD+. In other words, no issue carbon credits for 'not cutting down' the forest. Forestry activities in Gold Standard aim to restore forests by growing trees (afforestation/reforestation).




For more clarification, you can contact us at help@sustain-cert.com