TASC

Just returned from an incredible trip to our cookstove #carbon project in Zambia for TASC! 🌍 I had the pleasure of meeting all the wonderful monitors and witnessing their impressive cooking demonstration. 🍳 I was warmed by the hospitality and friendliness of all the Zambians I met. 🇿🇲 My favorite part was watching the stoves in action and how efficiently the monitors performed their kitchen performance tests. 🔥 A kitchen performance test or KPT is used to measure how much wood a household uses in a week. Our monitors visit the same household each day for five days in a row and weigh the wood that they have used for cooking. In this way, we can effectively monitor how much wood we save by distributing cookstoves! 🌿 It’s also very important to communicate well with the stove beneficiary during a #KPT. We ask them to make sure to only use wood from the pile set aside for weighing and if they need to add any wood to please wait for the monitor to return so that the new wood can be weighed before being added to the pile. 🪵📏 The beneficiaries had many questions about our stove maintenance, global warming and distribution of the #stoves. I am looking forward to applying what I’ve learned and of course to more trips to Zambia in the future. 

📢 TASC's Co-Founder Nick Marshall has written a piece for Sustainable Views, a specialist division of the Financial Times, on "The case for balanced corporate climate action: abatement and offsetting". This is particularly in response to the Science Based Targets initiative's recent announcement on the use of “environmental attribute certificates”, including voluntary carbon credits, to enable companies to achieve scope 3 emissions reduction targets. Sign up for a free trial and read the article here: https://lnkd.in/eKWFGi5R With thanks to Harry Hussain and the team at Frame

🌍 The Environmental Finance Voluntary Carbon Market Awards 2024! 🌍   Dear LinkedIn community, we are excited to share that the Environmental Finance Voluntary Carbon Market Awards 2024 have opened and we are looking to compete in the following categories:   🏆 Best Project Developer – Energy Efficiency: Our cookstove projects have touched the lives of many. In just five years we have successfully distributed a total of 1,101,782 cookstoves to households in South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe. We are currently the largest issuer of carbon credits in South Africa. 🏆 Best Project Developer – Forestry and Land-Use: In September 2023 we registered the first VM0042 project in the world. This project, which currently has 262 000 hectares under management, not only supports rural, communal farmers in employing regenerative agricultural practices, but also enables previously unattainable market access through mobile auctions and sheep shearing services. 🏆 Best Project Developer – Overall: TASC's comprehensive approach to project development and commitment to staying abreast of market developments and new methodologies ensures that we’re equipped with the knowledge to make impactful change in more ways than one.   📢 If you have direct experience in these markets and are a wholesale buyer in the VCM, we would be so grateful to receive your support and votes.    Simply follow the link below, enter your details and our name where you see fit. That’s all! 🔗 Vote for us here: https://lnkd.in/eKbSFBaA

📢 TASC is hiring! 📢 We have two positions open: Carbon Project Developer Manager: https://lnkd.in/ef5Y6NWM Ecologist: https://lnkd.in/eitYX8kC Please follow the links above if you'd like to join our team in Cape Town.🌞 #hiring #ecology #carbondeveloper

[Part 5/5] The final part of this Q&A with Stefan answers how joining the GRASS program has aided him in implementing regenerative land practices. He notes that being part of a team that is comprised of farmers, scientists, and experts has been the biggest aid in his journey, especially when faced with challenges along the way. Link to the project: https://lnkd.in/dcwhUXCX #soilcarbon #regenerativeagriculture #baselines

[Part 4/5] The fourth part of this week’s Q&A with Stefan answers why the scientific measurements, including the Environmental Outcomes Verification (EOV) assessment, is so important in establishing a baseline, to inform management decisions, and to track progress. After the Regenerative Land Management Course, TASC, in partnership with TruQuest, conduct an EOV assessment to measure and quantify their baseline. The baseline measurements include numerous biodiversity indicators as well as soil analyses. Measuring leading and lagging indicators allows farmers to make informed management decisions and track the trends on their farm. The measurements also allow us to quantify the improvements in soil carbon stocks. Link to the project: https://lnkd.in/dcwhUXCX #soilcarbon #regenerativeagriculture #baselines

We at TASC welcome the U.S. Department of the Treasury's intervention on integrity in voluntary carbon markets (VCM). We believe that integrity already exists in the VCM, but of course more can be done to establish the safeguards that ensure it. We very much support the 3 key integrity principles: supply integrity, demand integrity and market integrity. All too often the focus is purely on supply, but without demand and market integrity, none of this can work. As Janet Yellen rightly states; "if we do it well, we have the chance to enlist markets as a powerful ally in the fight against climate change" Let's do it 🙌 https://lnkd.in/gMCyAZqq

[Part 3/5]  The third part of this week’s Q&A with Stefan focuses on the highlights of his experience on the Land Management Course. The Land Management Course is a five-day course in Graaff-Reinet, Eastern Cape, where the farmers are taught the principles of regenerative and holistic land management and how they can practically apply these principles on their own farms. He discusses how he was pleasantly surprised at the great condition of the animals on the farm they visited. He was motivated by the practicality of the principles as well as excited and driven to implement them. Link to the project: https://lnkd.in/dcwhUXCX #soilcarbon #regenerativeagriculture #landmanagement

[Part 2/5] The second part of this week’s Q&A with Stefan addresses some of the hurdles he faced when starting his regenerative journey. In his experience, the shift in mindset from traditional thinking and assumptions toward a more holistic and adaptive approach to land management was one of the most significant challenges to be overcome.🐄 Link to the project: https://lnkd.in/dcwhUXCX #regenerativeagriculture #soilcarbon #sustainability

[Part 1/5] This week, we will be posting questions and answers from an interview with one of the commercial farmers joining us on their regenerative agricultural journey.🐑 In Part 1, Stefan Erasmus, based in the Eastern Cape Province, explains why he opted to partner with TASC and join the GRASS Project. Link to the project: https://lnkd.in/dcwhUXCX #regenerativeagriculture #farming #soilcarbon