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Sees carbon as integrated value driver for investors
BOSTON, April 6, 2022 /CNW/ – Manulife Investment Management announced today new guidelines for managing quality carbon credits for timberland and agriculture. The new principles have already been integrated into Manulife Investment Management’s timberland acquisition screening for both existing carbon projects and new carbon project development opportunities. They address the firm’s intention to generate high-integrity, high-quality carbon credits for investors and the environment.
Manulife Investment Management Logo (CNW Group/Manulife Investment Management)
“We recognize the demand for carbon offsets that is currently primarily driven by corporate net zero commitments; however, it is anticipated that voluntary carbon offset demand will increase by a factor of up to 100 times by 2050,” said Thomas G. Sarno, global head of timberland investments, Manulife Investment Management. “The increased demand is helping to move the carbon markets toward greater transparency and standardization for sequestration and is another way for clients to put capital to work while making a positive impact.”
“We’re confident that through the continued focus on natural capital accounting and applications of new and existing science to measure carbon capture in soil and generate resulting carbon value that we’ll deliver on the enormous potential for agriculture to contribute to the carbon sequestration goals sought by investors,” added Oliver S. Williams IV, CFA, global head of agricultural investments, Manulife Investment Management.
Over the past year, an internal working group at Manulife Investment Management conducted a landscape analysis of the leading carbon standards that various independent groups have created. The working group then developed a set of carbon principles aligned with the preliminary Core Carbon Principles created by the Integrity Council for the Voluntary Carbon Market—a recently launched governance body evolving from the Taskforce on Scaling Voluntary Carbon Markets. The firm includes—but does not limit—its new carbon guidelines to key principles of additionality, permanence, leakage, and accurate monitoring, reporting, and verification. The internal carbon standards working group will only recommend opportunities if the project closely adheres to the new guidelines.
Under these guidelines the carbon credits are required to be:
Real—They must genuinely reduce carbon emissions and