TIST Program in Kenya, VCS 009

Audit Analysis

The TIST Kenya program is a long-running (since 2004) smallholder agroforestry project with VVB-verified additionality, a 10% buffer pool, and no reported reversals, but it is undermined by a project-specific baseline, a thin 0% leakage justification, significant operational attrition (824 PAs removed, 149 pending), and delivery of only ~43% of the pro-rata ex-ante expectation for the 2016–2020 monitoring period. The large volume of non-conformances and open findings in the 2024 PRR indicate ongoing quality-control challenges.

Project Description

Red Flags

• ⚠Verified ERR of 132,727 tCO2e is only ~43% of the pro-rata ex-ante expectation (~311,000 tCO2e) for the 3.5-year monitoring period, suggesting the lifetime estimate of 2.64 M tCO2e may be optimistic
• ⚠824 Project Areas removed from the PD and 149 placed in 'Pending' status since the last monitoring period, indicating significant operational attrition
• ⚠Harvesting violations noted in specific groves (e.g., 2005KE890, 2006KE213) and 11 PAs had harvest activity in violation of contract during the second verification
• ⚠Open findings remain in the Project Review Report dated August 2024, and a FAR was issued for the related Uganda project (Verra 2496) regarding boundary anomalies
• ⚠Leakage deduction of 0% is justified only as 'deemed negligible' without a quantified survey or detailed justification in the extracted record

Credit Vintages Exhausted