iRise Selected as UN Lighthouse Project at COP 27

In November 2022, at the 27th Conference of the Parties — COP27 — held in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, iRise Carbon received one of the most meaningful designations a climate project can earn: selection as a UN Lighthouse Project. Administered under the UNFCCC's Marrakech Partnership for Global Climate Action, the Lighthouse Project designation is reserved for initiatives that demonstrate exceptional innovation, proven scalability, and genuine alignment with the Paris Agreement's most ambitious goals. For iRise — a programme still in its formative years at the time — the designation was a watershed moment that changed the trajectory of the project entirely.

What Is a UN Lighthouse Project?

The Lighthouse Projects programme was established to identify and amplify the most transformative climate solutions emerging from the non-state actor space — companies, civil society organisations, cities, and project developers whose work goes beyond national climate commitments and points the way towards faster, deeper, more equitable decarbonisation.

To be selected, a project must meet a set of exacting criteria. It must demonstrate genuine innovation — not just a new application of an existing model, but a structurally different approach to a climate challenge. It must be scalable: capable of replication across geographies without losing its core integrity. It must be measurable, with clear metrics for climate and community impact. And it must be aligned with the goals of the Paris Agreement — not just on carbon, but on equity, adaptation, and the principle that climate action must not leave vulnerable communities behind.

iRise Carbon met all of these criteria — and in the assessment of the UNFCCC's expert selectors, it met them with distinction.

COP27: The Implementation COP

COP27 in Sharm el-Sheikh was defined by a single overarching question: having made ambitious commitments in Paris and Glasgow, was the world actually delivering on them? The conference earned the informal title of the 'Implementation COP' — a reckoning with the growing gap between climate pledges and climate action.

It was also the COP at which the Loss and Damage Fund was finally agreed — a landmark outcome for climate-vulnerable developing nations, including Malawi, that had long argued for financial support not just for mitigation and adaptation but for the irreversible losses already being inflicted by climate change. For a project rooted in Malawi, one of the countries most acutely exposed to climate-driven floods, droughts, and land degradation, the establishment of the Loss and Damage Fund was deeply resonant.

It was in this context — of urgency, accountability, and a renewed focus on climate action in the Global South — that iRise Carbon's selection as a Lighthouse Project carried particular weight. This was not a theoretical programme, not a pilot, not a proof of concept built for a wealthy nation's domestic targets. This was a community-led reforestation initiative in one of the world's most climate-vulnerable countries, already operational and already delivering.

Why iRise Was Selected

The core of iRise's Lighthouse Project case rested on the structural innovation embedded in its community engagement model. Reforestation projects in sub-Saharan Africa were nothing new — but projects in which local communities were not just present but financially integrated into the long-term survival of the forest were genuinely rare. iRise had designed a system in which the economic incentives of smallholder farmers and the ecological requirements of a functioning forest were made identical, not merely compatible.

The selectors also recognised the programme's methodological seriousness. Rather than pursuing lower-barrier avoided deforestation credits, iRise had committed to the more demanding and more credible path: VM0047-based afforestation and reforestation on former degraded cropland, with the higher evidentiary standards that come with it. In an era when carbon credit integrity was already coming under scrutiny, that choice marked iRise out as a programme built for the long term.

Finally, the programme's institutional backing — including its direct agreements with the Government of Malawi — demonstrated the kind of sovereign-level buy-in that separates serious long-term programmes from project-level initiatives with no national anchor.

• Structural innovation: community members as economically integrated forest custodians, not passive beneficiaries
• Methodological rigour: VM0047 afforestation and reforestation on formerly degraded land
• Scalability: a model designed for replication across districts, regions, and countries
• Measurability: clear, verifiable metrics for both carbon impact and community livelihoods
• Institutional credibility: direct agreements with the Government of Malawi anchoring the programme
• Paris alignment: contributing to mitigation, community resilience, and just transition simultaneously

What the Designation Provided

Being named a UN Lighthouse Project is not a passive honour — it is an active designation that carries real-world consequences. The most immediate effect was visibility. Lighthouse Projects are featured in UNFCCC official communications, presented at high-level side events, and shared with the network of governments, development finance institutions, and corporate climate leaders who engage with the Marrakech Partnership. For a programme in its early stages of market development, that exposure was transformative.

Equally important was the credibility signal it sent to prospective carbon buyers and institutional partners. The voluntary carbon market relies on trust — and trust requires third-party validation. A UN Lighthouse designation, issued by the world's principal intergovernmental climate body, is among the most credible forms of third-party validation a project can receive. It told the market: this programme has been examined by people who know what they're looking for, and it meets the standard.

The designation also gave iRise access to a community of practice — a network of Lighthouse Project alumni, UNFCCC technical advisers, and fellow innovators — that proved invaluable in sharpening the programme's approach to monitoring, community reporting, and market positioning.

A Foundation for Everything That Followed

In retrospect, the UN Lighthouse Project designation at COP27 was the first domino in a sequence of recognitions and partnerships that have defined iRise Carbon's trajectory. The year after COP27 brought the Best Forestry Initiative award at COP28 in Dubai. That was followed by participation in COP29 in Baku alongside HE Dr Joyce Banda and Ismail Serageldin, the landmark clean cookstoves partnership with Mukuru, the expansion to 3 million trees in Kasungu, and ultimately selection for CEEZER's Carbon Coalition Accelerator in 2026.

None of those milestones were inevitable. They were earned — through consistent delivery, methodological integrity, and a refusal to simplify either the climate science or the community economics for the sake of a faster path to market. The Lighthouse Project designation recognised that commitment in 2022. The years since have vindicated it.

“Being recognised as a UN Lighthouse Project was the moment the world told us: what you are building in Malawi matters. That validation gave us the confidence to go further, faster, and with greater ambition than we had originally planned.”

— iRise Carbon, Offset8 Capital

About the UN Lighthouse Projects Programme

The Lighthouse Projects initiative is managed under the UNFCCC's Marrakech Partnership for Global Climate Action — a framework that enables non-state actors including businesses, investors, cities, and civil society to support the goals of the Paris Agreement. Lighthouse Projects are selected annually and represent the most innovative and scalable climate solutions from across the private and civil society sphere. They are presented formally at the COP high-level summits and serve as flagship examples for the broader global climate action ecosystem.