SDG 15: Life on Land — Malawi's Forest Carbon Story

The United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 15 calls for the protection, restoration, and sustainable management of terrestrial ecosystems. In Malawi — one of the most deforested countries in sub-Saharan Africa — that goal is not abstract. It is urgent, specific, and measurable.

Malawi has lost more than 40 percent of its forest cover in the past four decades. Charcoal production, subsistence farming, and population pressure have pushed deforestation rates to among the highest on the continent. The consequences are compounding: soil erosion accelerates, water catchments fail, agricultural yields decline, and communities that depend on forest resources find themselves in a deteriorating cycle with no easy exit.

“SDG 15 is not just about trees. It is about the communities whose livelihoods, food security, and futures are inseparable from the health of the land they live on.”

What iRise Carbon is building at Mpasadzi

iRise Carbon's land restoration programme is centred on the Mpasadzi Forest Reserve in central Malawi — a degraded woodland registered under Verra's VM0047 methodology, one of the most rigorous standards available for Afforestation, Reforestation and Revegetation projects.

The project has a 10,000-hectare footprint. Restoration work includes the direct planting of native tree species, the establishment of community-managed protection zones, and the systematic monitoring of biomass growth against independently measured baselines.

Every site is geotagged before planting begins. Canopy cover is tracked by satellite on a defined monitoring schedule. Baseline carbon stock was independently measured — not modelled from regional averages. Credits are only issued after third-party verification confirms that the biomass growth claimed is real.

SDG 15 in numbers: what our work delivers

• 10,000 hectares of degraded land targeted for restoration
• Native species selected for ecological compatibility and long-term carbon sequestration
• Community stewardship agreements in place at every site before planting begins
• Verified under Verra VM0047 — one of the most data-intensive ARR methodologies available
• Article 6 Letter of Approval from the Government of Malawi — the first issued in the country

Why SDG 15 and carbon integrity are the same conversation

There is a version of land restoration that produces carbon credits but does not produce ecosystems. Trees planted without community buy-in get cut down. Sites without monitoring drift back to degradation. Baselines modelled from desk estimates produce inflated credit numbers that do not reflect what is actually growing.

iRise Carbon's position is that SDG 15 outcomes and carbon integrity are not separate things. If the credit is real, the ecosystem benefit is real. If the ecosystem benefit is not real, the credit is not real. Our verification framework is built around this principle — every credit we issue is traceable to a specific site, a specific measurement, and a specific community that is invested in the outcome.

“You cannot restore land on paper. The only SDG 15 outcome that matters is the one you can stand in.”

This week at iRise Carbon

This is Week 2 of our 15-week series. On Wednesday, our Carbon Director Mussa Kamanula explains what the iRise Carbon cookstove verification standard actually looks like — the process, the data, and the difference it makes to the integrity of every credit we issue.

On Friday, Mussa introduces himself in the first of many team profiles — the people behind the data, in their own words.

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www.irisecarbon.com · Carbon with Integrity