A private company, GreenTrees, is creating long-term contracts with landowners in the Lower Mississippi River Alluvial Valley, including Western Kentucky, to plant forests of cottonwood and other hardwoods. The purpose of the project is to create value through a combination of biomass production for industry and carbon sequestration opportunities. Carbon sequestration will create income streams through trading in carbon cap and trade markets.
In exchange for leasing the land to GreenTrees, landowners receive up-front payments, timber harvest income, recreational income, carbon-based income, and appreciating property values, as well as federal and state conservation incentives and payments. Landowners can engage in these kinds of activities on their own, but they can’t tap into the up-front income offered by GreenTrees.
The Lower Mississippi River Alluvial Valley was a richly forested region until the 20th century, when bottom-land farming of soybeans cleared vast areas of land. These lands are in the long run more valuable for carbon storage and watershed protection than crop production.
Stay tuned for more information on this interesting development.
Cross posted at Sustainable Kentucky and Tree Trends.
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Hi we are a ghanian NGO based in Accra we campang agaist climate change we distribute seedillings to local farmers allover Ghana we have so far giving out over ten million seedilling in the last three years
Thanks
kwabena
Thanks for the comment, Kwabena. That is very encouraging news, and I wish you great success.