TRI–CECAB Agroforestry Carbon Programme — São Tomé's First Payment for Ecosystem Services Scheme

Since 2018, the GEF-funded, FAO/IUCN-supported 'Restoration Initiative' (TRI) has worked with São Tomé and Príncipe's Directorate of Forests and Biodiversity and CECAB, the archipelago's largest cocoa cooperative, to restore degraded shade-grown cocoa and forest land across both islands.

Restore degraded agroforestry and forest land toward a 12,000 ha target, and — from 2023 — layer on the country's first formal Payment for Ecosystem Services mechanism by monetising the carbon sequestered on restored smallholder plots.

By 2023, IUCN reported 9,683 ha brought under restoration and 23,226 ha under improved management, with 91,401 tree seedlings of 61 species produced that year alone and roughly 1,500 farmers issued planting kits; in early 2023 TRI partnered with Acorn, Rabobank's agroforestry carbon programme, to measure, certify and sell verified carbon removal units from restored smallholder plots to corporate buyers.

Reporting on the wider Acorn programme indicates roughly 70% of credit revenue is intended to flow back to smallholders, though São Tomé-specific payment totals have not been independently published; restoration progress (9,683 ha) remains below the 12,000 ha target.

Because the carbon-payment layer is only a few years old and STP-specific verification and payment data are not yet public, the evidence here rests mainly on restoration-hectare and seedling counts rather than audited carbon or income figures — a gap worth watching as Acorn's verification cycles mature.