FBA signs MOU with GreenCollar, carbon project developer

Posted on November 9th, 2016

JOINT RELEASE – FBA & GREENCOLLAR
An MOU signed between FBA, the region’s leading Natural Resource Management body and GreenCollar, will ensure carbon abatement in vegetation and soils delivers both economic benefits and improved environmental outcomes.
GreenCollar, a commercial carbon project developer working with graziers and farmers in the Fitzroy Basin, will work in partnership with organisations like FBA, to use income generated by carbon projects as a catalyst for larger scale investment to benefit landowners, the regional economy, land condition, water quality and the environment.
FBA CEO Paul Birch said “he hopes that closer collaboration with GreenCollar will see carbon storage in vegetation and soils delivering additional regional environmental and economic benefits”.
“Through this MOU we want to ensure these projects support our goal of improving water quality flowing to the GBR, improving practice and contributing to our local economies.”
GreenCollar co-founder, James Schultz said the company wants to work with landowners, the FBA, industry groups and government so the money invested goes well beyond storing carbon to include environmental, economic and social co-benefits.
“We plan to bring together a range of partnerships in the coming months that will see the income from our carbon projects used to underpin a larger scale of investment into biodiversity, water quality and sustainable use as well as creating an additional, bankable commodity for graziers and farmers,” said Mr Schultz
An agreement between the Queensland Government and the private sector GreenCollar Group, was recently expanded to include the Queensland Natural Resource Management (NRM) group’s peak body, the Regional Groups Collective. The focus of this agreement is to ensure carbon stored by growing trees along waterways on degraded lands and in wetlands also reduces sediment and nutrient losses that have been the primary cause reef decline to date.
Under the newly negotiated agreement more than AU$200 million is now to be invested into the Queensland coastal landscapes over the next ten years. “We hope the agreement initially with the Queensland Government, the NRM peak body  and now with individual regions will lead to leveraging this AU$200m investment 10-fold,” Mr Schultz said.