Offsetting human rights

Sexual abuse and harassment at the Kasigau Corridor REDD+ Project in Kenya

Publication

6 November 2023

reading time 1 minute

This report focuses on one of the most celebrated carbon offsetting projects, which is widely praised for how it boosts local development and empowers women and youth: the Kasigau Corridor REDD+ Project (‘Kasigau’), situated in south-east Kenya, founded and run by the United States company Wildlife Works.

The Kasigau Corridor project is the first REDD+ project; its first phase was approved by Verra in 2011. Verra sets standards in carbon offset programmes, issues the credits and oversees their quality and integrity. Wildlife Works uses Kasigau to make a product – carbon credits. They sell this product to big multinational companies that then use it to “offset” their carbon emissions and claim to move towards net zero. Dozens of commercial actors, including Microsoft, Netflix, Mckinsey, Shell, and others, have bought carbon credits from this project.

An investigation by SOMO and Kenya Human Rights Commission (KHRC) reveals that Wildlife Works is responsible for serious human rights abuses at the Kasigau project in Kenya, contrary to its social and ethical branding. A team of researchers interviewed 31 current and former employees of the Wildlife Works’ Kasigau project and members of the local community.

These interviews reveal widespread sexual harassment and abuse by certain male staff -mostly in senior positions at Wildlife Works. Our findings show that Wildlife Works has allowed or enabled a context of serious abuse to persist in Kasigau for a decade or more and sold its products as ethical when they are anything but.

Offsetting human rights is the first report in a SOMO series examining the human rights impacts of forest-based carbon offsetting.