The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) was established under Article 12 of the Kyoto Protocol adopted by the Third Conference of the Parties to the Framework Convention on Climate Change on December 11, 1997.

The dual goals of the CDM are
1. To promote sustainable development in developing countries and
2. To allow industrialized countries to earn emissions credits from their investments in emission-reducing projects in developing countries.

To earn credits under the CDM, the project proponent must prove and have verified that the greenhouse gas emissions reductions are real, measurable and additional to what would have occurred in the absence of the project.

CDM and Africa Soils

The agriculture sector dominates the economies of most sub-Saharan countries, contributing about one-third of the region’s GDP, accounting for forty percent of the export, and employing about two-thirds of the economically active population. Moreover, some soils in sub-Saharan Africa could, by providing sinks for carbon sequestration, play an important role in managing global climate change. Improvements in agricultural techniques and land use practices could lead to higher agricultural productivity and accumulate soil carbon. Hence, soil carbon sequestration could produce local economic income as well as social and other benefits in Africa.

The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) established in the 1997 Kyoto Protocol is designed to give developed countries with high domestic abatement cost access to low-cost greenhouse gas abatement projects in developing countries, and to benefit developing countries selling projects to investors in developed countries.

Few cost estimates of soil carbon sequestration strategies presently exist. While these costs are uncertain and all input costs have not been estimated, manure-based projects in small-holdings in Kenya could increase maize yield significantly and sequester one ton of soil carbon for a net cost of – US$806. Clearly, such projects would be very attractive economically ( Ringius, Lasse 1999).  These estimated benefits do not factor the additionally value that the biochar approach would bring to such communities and the global climate in general.