Improved agricultural land management, South Africa

Potential farmers and farm managers were engaged through existing relationships with agronomists known to Orizon, during farmer days, or through referrals from other farmers. This approach helped build strong, trustworthy relationships from the outset with the 22 initial project instances, which span 905 fields and cover 15,547 hectares across the North West, Free State, Gauteng, Mpumalanga, and KwaZulu-Natal provinces in South Africa. According to the 2018–2022 Monitoring Report, the main practices adopted by these 22 farms were cover cropping, reduced tillage, and increased application of organic inputs. These practices improve soil water retention, reduce surface runoff, and increase soil organic carbon.

During the first monitoring period, the project achieved significant climate mitigation results, including a reduction of 1,000.2 tCO₂e from fossil fuel use, 1,911.7 tCO₂e from liming, and a total decrease of 200,377 tCO₂e in GHG emissions. Rather than dictating specific farming methods, Orizon is offering expert agricultural advice to support the transition from conventional to more sustainable practices. The participating farmers are well equipped to implement these approaches, with an average of 21.7 years of experience in successfully managing and applying agricultural practices on the project fields.

At a farmer level, the project provides direct economic benefits through a benefit-sharing model, ensuring that participating farmers receive 65–75% of the revenues from carbon credit sales by the project developer, Orizon. The percentage payable depends on the extent of sustainable and regenerative practices adopted: farmers implementing one qualifying practice receive 65%, those adopting two to three practices receive 70%, and those applying more than three receive 75%.

Additionally, farmers incur no costs to join the project, maximising their financial benefits. To safeguard primary revenues, productivity losses cannot exceed 5%, ensuring that project activities do not cause a material decline in income. Project activities will also result in diversified revenue streams, thereby reducing business risk.

The project team fosters strong relationships with farmers through multiple on-site visits each year, providing hands-on guidance to help them transition to more sustainable practices. This support is further strengthened by collaborations with external consultants, researchers, and agricultural organisations. In the long term, regenerative practices are expected to build a more resilient farming system, ensuring sustained profitability and stability for farmers.

At a broader scale, improved soil health and water use efficiency leads to a more resilient food production system, which contributes to long-term food security in South Africa. Reduced soil erosion, less use of synthetic fertilisers and a better soil structure facilitates improved water cycling, with cleaner rivers and dams and more steady water flow and underground water reserves. Less inputs reduces the need for environmentally harmful mining of resources and improves the food value chain’s resilience to global events impacting resource prices and logistics.

Finally, these practices generate new employment opportunities such as tending to rotational livestock, planting cover crops, managing composting operations, creating much-needed jobs in a region facing high unemployment rates.

The South African agricultural sector is largely dominated by conventional farming methods, which contribute to soil degradation and organic carbon loss. As mentioned, cultivated soils in South Africa have lost 46% of their organic carbon since farming began, and topsoil erosion due to conventional crop production occurs at a rate of 13 t/ha/year. To combat these challenges, this project supports and incentivises farmers to adopt sustainable agricultural practices by distributing a majority share of carbon credit revenues, enabling a viable transition to regenerative farming.

Currently, 22 farms involved in this project are implementing sustainable practices, covering 15,547 hectares. Regenerative practices are known to have positive benefits to local biodiversity and the ecosystem. Optimised fertiliser application reduces water pollution, irrigation management minimises nutrient leaching, and reduced tillage improves soil structure and allows mycorrhizal to build soil aggregates which facilitate optimal root growth and build a network to transfer nutrients and water.

Improved crop planting and harvesting also regulates soil heat to avoid extreme temperatures which are destructive to soil microbiology, and builds soil structure which reduces soil erosion from surface runoff or wind. A healthier, microbe-rich soil forms the foundation of a healthy food- chain within the local ecosystem.

In addition to the above, the project has also partnered with various institutions such as BirdLife South Africa, who are monitoring critically endangered bird species on selected farmers’ lands, such as the Botha’s Lark. In the future, the project aims to expand its positive environmental impact by advising participating farmers on wetland rehabilitation opportunities present in project fields.