Version: April 2013

Women Organizing for Change in

Agriculture & Natural Resource

Management

Women’s Carbon Standard (WCS) Version: April 2013

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Executive Summary

The Women’s Carbon Standard (WCS) is a set of project design and implementation requirements that complement existing compliance or voluntary carbon standards. The WCS specifically includes measures to integrate and measure women’s empowerment and participation in carbon mitigation projects. The WCS quantifies beneficial outcomes for women, their families and communities.

WOCAN’s objective is to improve the lives of women in developing economies by incentivizing investments in carbon projects that incorporate standards of women’s empowerment into the project development cycle. WOCAN’s perception is that women’s empowerment can contribute to sustainable development and poverty alleviation. The power of global carbon markets can be engaged to advance these goals.

WOCAN believes that the use of this standard, the Women’s Carbon Standard, to promote empowerment will ultimately change business as usual in the global carbon markets. Just as the Fair Trade label has revolutionized consumer buying habits, WOCAN sees the potential to drive investments to projects that support women’s empowerment. When the livelihoods of women improve, broader economic, social, and environmental improvements follow.

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Contents

Executive Summary ...................................................................................................... ii

Introduction ................................................................................................................... 1

Benefits of Using the Women’s Carbon Standard (WCS) .......................................... 2

Who Should Use the WCS ............................................................................................ 2

How is the Women’s Carbon Standard Administered ................................................ 4

Implementing the Women’s Carbon Standard ............................................................ 4

Applicability ..................................................................................................................... 4

Project Coordination ........................................................................................................ 4

Requirements ................................................................................................................ 5

The following paragraphs provide a brief description of each of the domains and examples of criteria to be measured. Additional details and direction are available in the Program Guide. ......................... 5

Income and Assets ................................................................................................................................ 5

Time ....................................................................................................................................................... 6

Education and Knowledge ..................................................................................................................... 6

Leadership ............................................................................................................................................. 6

Food Security ......................................................................................................................................... 7

Health ..................................................................................................................................................... 7

Validation/verification ...................................................................................................... 7

Definitions ...................................................................................................................... 8

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Introduction

WOCAN (Women Organizing for Change in Agriculture and Natural Resource Management) builds women’s leadership in agriculture and natural resource management through organizational and individual transformation. WOCAN’s vision is of a world where gender equality has been achieved within agriculture and natural resource management organizations, policies, programs and markets, achieving food security and sustainable development.

Natural resource systems and local economies benefit when women are included and empowered. An increasing number of governments and international organizations understand the need to incorporate gender into climate change and food security policies, programs and budgets; this is evidenced by increasing references to gender and the need for gender equality in the UNFCCC texts. The decision text on the Green Climate Fund also has strong references to gender. In many regions, women are the primary food producers and natural resource managers, as well as market actors. Working at the intersection of gender equality, women’s social and economic empowerment, food security and climate change mitigation, WOCAN has developed the Women’s Carbon Standard (WCS) as a means of making positive contributions to each of these important issues. The WCS is protocol designed to be applied to carbon offset projects in order to enhance the social and economic empowerment of women associated with these projects. One of WOCAN’s goals is to create additional value to these projects, through the application of the WCS. The objective is to return profits from the sale of offsets back to women and women’s groups, creating a sustainable circle of environmental restoration and support for women’s economic and social empowerment.

WOCAN envisions clear, positive outcomes which would be measured according to indicators of success, represented by measurable activities within six domains listed below. The Program Guide document includes practical information for project design and implementation.

Income and Assets

Time

Education and Knowledge

Leadership

Food Security Health

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Benefits of Using the Women’s Carbon Standard (WCS)

WOCAN believes that the use of the WCS to promote women’s empowerment will ultimately improve women’s lives. Just as the Fair Trade label has revolutionized consumer buying habits, WOCAN sees the potential to drive consumer awareness and investment toward projects that institutionalize empowerment and improve the lives of rural women, their families and communities.

WOCAN’s WCS espouses three principles:

1. WOCAN will challenge the prevailing public perception of women as members of a vulnerable groups most affected by climate change, thus limiting their opportunities to participate in the market. This will be done by showcasing their roles as entrepreneurs, resource managers and leaders who engage with carbon markets.

2. WOCAN will employ the WCS as a transparent, rigorous, and realistic mechanism that can promote women’s empowerment using private sector market approaches. This is a necessary to quantify and value women’s contributions to GHG mitigation.

3. The WCS will permit projects that include social co-benefits for women to receive a premium price the carbon market. Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) buyers - those companies who pay for offsets to enhance their brand image - are willing to pay more for credits that are generated from projects that have compelling human interest stories.

The prevailing public perception of women as members of a vulnerable groups most affected by climate change limits their opportunities to participate in the market and obtain benefits to improve their quality of life. This perception should be changed to enable their engagement in climate change mitigation programs

A transparent, rigorous, and realistic mechanism that can promote women’s empowerment using private sector market approaches is needed to quantify and value to women’s contributions to GHG mitigation.

Premium projects that include social co-benefits – such as the WCS – are more valued in the marketplace. Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) buyers - those companies who pay for offsets to enhance their brand image - are willing to pay more for credits that are generated from projects that have compelling human interest stories.

Who Should Use the WCS

The WCS can be applied by a range of implementers. While users may have differing objectives, the utilization of the WCS will optimize the social and economic empowerment of women in the project marketplace. Potential implementers include:

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Carbon Offset Project Developers – Projects can integrate the WCS from the initial phases of project design, or may choose to integrate WCS into existing projects. Carbon offset project developers using any of the current standards (such Gold Standard, VCS, or CDM, for example) may find that through the inclusion of the social component of the WCS, increased value is created for offset.

Community Project Developers – Working on their own or in collaboration with international development organizations, community-based or non-government organization (NGO) project developers may consider implementing the WCS as a means to quantify the value provided to women and women’s groups within the project community.

International Development Organizations – As more governments and institutions recognize the importance of women’s inclusion and empowerment in natural resource management policies and programs, these organizations may decide (and may encourage others) to apply the WCS to the climate and community development projects they fund.

Investors and Companies supporting Corporate Social Responsibility portfolios are a natural impetus for the implementation of the WCS and the market penetration of WCS-enhanced carbon offsets.

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How is the Women’s Carbon Standard Administered

Initially, WOCAN will administer the Women’s Carbon Standard.

More specific details including time-frames, documentation requirements, community coordination and engagement best practices, expectations for specificity and completeness and processes and procedures for administration of the WCS are maintained in the WCS Program Guide.

Implementing the Women’s Carbon Standard

The WCS should be used in accordance with the WCS Program Guide, available on the Women’s Carbon Standard website, www.womenscarbon.org.

Applicability

The implementation of the WCS begins with a determination of whether the WCS can be used in conjunction with carbon offset project.

To determine this applicability, a project implementer shall evaluate:

The degree of women’s current engagement in existing projects (establishing a baseline, using the six domains referenced in the Program Guide);

Opportunities for the project/s to enhance women’s empowerment within the scope (project boundary) of the project.

Project Coordination

The project developer or implementation team should coordinate use of the WCS within the selected project in a clear and transparent manner, taking overall responsibility, providing the requisite capacity to support the women’s empowerment activities, completing independent third party validation/verification and maintaining appropriate records, as outlined in the Program Guide.

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Requirements

The WCS domains and criteria have been developed through a consultative process with stakeholders that included communities within projects in Asia and Africa, subject matter specialists in gender and carbon project development to form the basic requirements of the standard. Each application of the standard will measure how well a project meets each criteria through the validation and verification process. These are the requirements that will be used to evaluate a project’s conformance and to determine how the project has improved the quality of life for women in the community. The women’s empowerment criteria fall into six domains:

Income and Assets

Time

Education and Knowledge

Leadership

Food Security

Health

The following paragraphs provide a brief description of each of the domains and examples of criteria to be measured. Additional details and direction are available in the Program Guide.

Income and Assets

The project implementer shall evaluate how the project has increased the income and assets (material goods, monetary resources, land and livestock, etc.) that are accessible to or controlled by women within households and communities where the project is implemented. Specifically, the project implementer shall evaluate if there is an increase in ownership of assets by women resulting from the project implementation and/or an increase in women’s ability to generate income, and an increase in women’s control of household income and assets. Examples of assets may be money, jewelry, land, trees, livestock, or equipment. The provision of legal rights to women, including that of citizenship can be a key to improving access to income and assets.

Conformance can be shown through the provision of women’s access to business management and micro-finance services for women (both formal and informal), women’s savings and loan initiatives (both formal and informal), and new business opportunities in agro-enterprises. Other activities include skill development to develop projects and proposals for funding, provision of agricultural inputs, support to women’s cooperatives and advocacy for women to obtain land titles or certificates of ownership or leases.

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Time

The project implementer shall evaluate how the project has improved the well being and productivity of the women involved in or affected by the project (as in within the project boundary). For the purposes of this standard, some ways this can be determined is by measuring and documenting the increase in women’s discretionary or leisure time, by measuring shifts in the use of time away from lower-value activities toward higher-value activities, reduction in drudgery (gathering fuel, carrying water, etc.), or the increase in men’s sharing of work usually done by women. Other measures could include such things as women’s access to electricity, time-saving technologies, and tools (e.g., tractors, biogas, improved cook stoves, water pumps, storage facilities, etc.) that can reduce the time women spend in household and farm tasks.

The availability of discretionary time often enables women to engage in activities that increase their knowledge and skills, and develop their leadership capabilities to participate in decision making. It also has health benefits and fosters success in other domains measured in the WCS.

Education and Knowledge

The project implementer shall evaluate how the project has resulted in women’s increased knowledge and skills, as well as the transmittal of women’s knowledge and skills to others in the community, within the boundaries or scope of the project. This can be measured by increased access to extension services to enhance knowledge about agriculture, forest management, livestock and health, renewable energy, etc. Other skills include those of basic reading and writing, numeracy, business management, computer and GPS use, and communication. Local initiatives to share knowledge, skills and information and invitations to participate in training and education opportunities and exposure visits to observe successful initiatives in other communities, especially those run by women, can provide strong incentives and positive examples.

Leadership

The project implementer shall evaluate how the implementation of the project has resulted in increased decision making roles for women – within the context of the project itself or within communities within the project boundary. This can be measured through evaluating increases in the representation and participation of women both quantitatively and qualitatively in governance bodies of community organizations (measuring how many women are in leadership roles and how many are active in discussions and decisions). In some areas, quotas for the representation of women in governance bodies may have been established and should be documented. Another measure to be documented is an increase in the effectiveness of women's groups to advocate, manage funds, negotiate and network through leadership and entrepreneurship skill development and coaching.

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Food Security

The project implementer shall evaluate how the project has decreased the quantity and quality of food insecurity within households within the project scope or boundary. This can be measured through documentation of increased yields and diversity of crops and vegetables and other improvements in farming systems. Another approach is to measure and document improvements in tools or access to tools, food storage facilities, irrigation systems and farming practices that result in improved crop yields and decreased post-harvest losses, leading to more availability of nutritious foods for women and their families.

This indicator is highly dependent on local conditions and the criteria for conformance should be carefully defined during the project design if possible and definitely prior to validation/verification site visits.

Health

The project implementer shall evaluate how the project has improved the overall health of women and their families and community members within the project scope or boundary. Improvements that can be measured and documented include; improved local or regional air quality, improved local water quality and quantity, and new or improved sanitation services. Conformance can also be documented through improved education, additional health clinics and improved staffing and supplies to existing health clinics. Additional circumstances that can be measured and documented may include: infant mortality rates, maternal mortality rates, rates of anaemia amongst women and local disease rates (respiratory, gastrointestinal, etc.).

Validation/verification

The WCS was developed to quantify the impact of carbon offsets projects on the quality of life of women in a robust manner that can be monitored and measured over time. Validation/verification is a critical component to assure that projects are supporting activities that result in significant improvements in women’s lives.

The WCS can be applied at the Validation or Verification stage of a project.

A complete table describing the criteria, including; Domain, Outcome, Indicators, and Means of Verification is provided in the Program Guide. Please note that “Activities” are provided as examples and will vary by project and according to local conditions.

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Definitions

Carbon Offsets – A carbon offset is a reduction in emissions of carbon dioxide or greenhouse gases made in order to compensate for or to offset an emission made elsewhere. Carbon offsets are measured in metric tons of carbon dioxide-equivalent (CO2e) and may represent six primary types of greenhouse gases. These include: carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), perfluorocarbons (PFCs), hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), and sulfur hexafluoride (SF6).

Carbon Offset Projects – A carbon mitigation project refers to a business initiative that receives funding because of the cut the emission of greenhouse gases (GHGs) that will result. To prove that the project will result in real, permanent, verifiable reductions in Greenhouse Gases, proof must be provided in the form of a project design document and activity reports validated by an approved third party

Project Developers (PDs) – Any business, organization or community engaged in pursuing Carbon Projects.

CDM/Clean Development Mechanism – The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) is

one of the flexibility mechanisms defined in the Kyoto Protocol (IPCC, 2007) that

provides for emissions reduction projects which generate Certified Emission

Reduction units which may be traded in emissions trading schemes.

The CDM is defined in Article 12 of the Protocol, and is intended to meet two objectives:

(1) to assist parties not included in Annex I in achieving sustainable development and in

contributing to the ultimate objective of the United Nations Framework Convention on

Climate Change (UNFCCC), which is to prevent dangerous climate change; and (2) to

assist parties included in Annex I in achieving compliance with their quantified emission

limitation and reduction commitments (greenhouse gas (GHG) emission caps). "Annex

I" parties are those countries that are listed in Annex I of the treaty, and are the

industrialized countries. Non-Annex I parties are developing countries.

Conformance – Compliance with the WCS.

Criteria – The activities, changes or events which are to be measured to implement a WCS project and to assess the effectiveness of a WCS project.

GHG Credit – Equivalent to a Carbon Offset. A Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Credit is a unit of value ascribed to a specific reduction (or avoidance) in emissions. (Typically one ton equivalent of C02). GHG Credits are used by purchasers to ‘offset’ their greenhouse gas emissions (thus ‘carbon offset’) either voluntarily or for compliance obligations.

GHG Project – A carbon mitigation project.

Existing Carbon Projects – Projects under any current carbon offset standard which are already operating.

The Gold Standard - The Gold Standard is an independent mechanism for creating high-quality emission reductions projects in the Clean Development

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Mechanism (CDM) Joint Implementation (JI) and Voluntary Carbon Market. It was designed to ensure that carbon credits are not only real and verifiable but that they make measurable contributions to sustainable development worldwide. Its objective is to add branding, a label to existing and new Carbon Credits generated by projects which can then be bought and traded by countries that have a binding legal commitment according to the Kyoto Protocol.

Outcome Indicators – Categories of activity outcomes which are used to measure the effectiveness of a WCS project.

Project Developers (PDs) – Any business, organization or community engaged in pursuing Carbon Projects.

Project Implementer – Any business, organization or community, or its contracted designee, implementing and administering Carbon Projects.

Project Proponent – The ISO term used to describe the entity which has overall control and responsibility for the project. Also used by VCS and the Climate Action Reserve.

Project Idea Note – A WCS project developer or implementer must submit an initial Project Idea Note which contains information about the WCS implementation component of the project. Please refer to the Program Guide for details.

Verification/Validation - Verification and Validation are independent procedures that

are used together for checking that a product, service, or system meets requirements

and specifications and that it fulfills its intended purpose. The words "verification" and

"validation" are sometimes preceded with "Independent" (or I V&V), indicating that the

verification and validation is to be performed by a disinterested third-party.

It is sometimes said that validation can be expressed by the question "Are you building

the right thing?" and verification by "Are you building it right?"

VCS/Voluntary Carbon Standard/Verified Carbon Standard (VCS) – The Verified Carbon Standard (VCS) formerly the Voluntary Carbon Standard is a quality standard for the voluntary carbon offset industry. Based on the Kyoto Protocol's Clean Development Mechanism, VCS establishes criteria for validating, measuring, and monitoring carbon offset projects.

WCS Program Guide - describes such things as the principles, procedures,

registration, execution, practical application of the WCS.