Agreement demonstrates shared commitment to high-integrity projects that, beyond sequestering carbon, support biodiversity and benefit local communities long term

Catona Climate, a global climate finance company, announced that Microsoft has signed a six-year offtake agreement to purchase 350,000 tonnes of carbon removal credits from an agroforestry project in Kenya. Funded, designed and managed by Catona in collaboration with long-standing nonprofit partner, Trees for the Future, this project supports Microsoft’s goal to become carbon negative by 2030.

The Lake Victoria Watershed Agroforestry Project located in Homa Bay, Kenya, partners with 15,000 local smallholder farmers to develop forest gardens — multi-tiered mixtures of trees, shrubs, and crops — on their land. Farmers receive training in this agricultural practice that maximizes yields without the use of fertilizers or pesticides, prevents deforestation and biodiversity loss, reduces impacts from drought and soil runoff from integrated water and soil conservation, provides consistent income streams, and increases food security.

“Catona has been instrumental in helping us finance, design and implement this groundbreaking community-driven project, and I’m thrilled to have a climate leader like Microsoft involved as well,” said Tim McLellan, Trees for the Future CEO. “Microsoft’s support of nature-based solutions and this project align nicely with our vision to revitalize degraded lands and enhance the lives of farming communities around the world through sustainable agroforestry practices.”

This project highlights the high-quality nature-based solutions that make up Catona’s carbon portfolio, developed in partnership with a network of trusted project implementation partners like Trees for the Future and collaboration with leading corporate purchasers of carbon removal like Microsoft.

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“This collaboration demonstrates what’s possible when like-minded stakeholders come together to align on project quality and impact,” added Rob Lee, Catona Climate’s Chief Carbon Officer. “There is no path to meeting Paris Agreement targets that doesn’t involve carbon removals. Our job is to source, vet, design, finance, monitor and measure the projects that will allow companies like Microsoft to achieve their climate goals, so we can all look forward to a sustainable future.”

Brian Marrs, Senior Director for Energy & Carbon Removal at Microsoft said, “With organizations like Catona, we’re able to add agroforestry projects to our portfolio that not only remove carbon but also meaningfully support biodiversity and benefit local communities in the short and long term.”