Our Principles
Urgent action is needed to address the climate and biodiversity crises and ensure climate justice globally.
As a contribution to this growing body of work, these principles and guidance have been developed to align stakeholders around a shared vision for Serendib’s Principles of Developing high-quality blue carbon projects and credits. This shared vision for quality can serve a foundational role in building confidence in and momentum around blue carbon project development and investments.
Our Principles
Serendib Capital’s high-quality blue carbon projects and credits optimize outcomes for people, nature, and climate in a transparent and equitable way.
Sequester and store carbon with high fidelity.
Restore the ecological integrity and resilience of the ecosystem in question.
Pathways for local and Indigenous communities to equitably participate.
Allow local communities to benefit from the carbon market.
Safeguard Nature
Blue carbon projects provide unique opportunities to preserve and enhance ecosystem resilience.
Conserve our planet’s remaining intact ecosystems.
Design projects in accordance with science-based ecological protocols.
Most importantly, do no harm to environments & local community.
Empower People
Most blue carbon projects take place where people live and work. Blue carbon practitioners must implement social safeguards to protect and enhance community member rights, knowledge, and leadership and foster equitable access to the global carbon market.
Ensure that free, prior and informed consent (FPIC) is established.
Ensure inclusive participation and leadership of Indigenous Peoples and local communities (IPLCs), women, and other marginalized groups in project design, governance, and management.
Ensure feedback, accountability, and grievance mechanisms are available to all rightsholders and stakeholders.
Respect traditional land use practices and legal rights to land, resources, and carbon.
Provide equitable access to the global voluntary carbon market by empowering local communities with the means to participate and lead.
Empower local communities to define equitable benefit sharing.
Best Practice
The integrity of the VCM hinges, in part, on the quality of information used to design projects and communicate the resulting carbon value of the credits generated.
Use the most appropriate interventions and the best available scientific knowledge, including Indigenous, traditional, and local knowledge.
Ensure transparent and accurate greenhouse gas accounting and monitoring by using a scientifically sound methodology or protocol.
Establish accurate carbon baselines through evidence-based assessments.
Demonstrate additionality using clear evidence and reasoning.
Assess threats to durability.
Establish measures to mitigate risk of reversal.
Employ adaptive management protocols.
Weigh the tradeoffs between actual and anticipated credit types.
Local & Contextual
Blue carbon ecosystems are incredibly heterogeneous with respect to their role in local customs; gender and power dynamics; resource use, management, and ownership regimes; and social, policy, and governance structures.
Design projects according to the local social and ecological context.
Account for the local implications of international policies.
Advance policies to promote high-quality blue carbon project development.
Establish a diverse network of local partners to ensure project success and longevity.
High-Integrity Capital
We cannot achieve the best outcomes for people, nature, and climate without high-integrity financial flows.
Set science-based targets for limiting global average temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius and compensate for remaining emissions with high-quality carbon credits.
Design agreements and contracts to promote fair and transparent pricing and compensation.
Blue carbon ecosystems
The positive impact of a mangrove ecosystems on the planet
These vegetated coastal ecosystems have been recognized for their remarkable capacity to act as highly efficient carbon sinks. Blue Carbon differentiates the carbon fixed through coastal ocean ecosystems from that in traditional land ecosystems, such as forests.
