The Project

Jacks Valley Farm resides in the Graham Valley close to the foot of Mount Arthur, Kahurangi National Park. Over the last 100 years the property has been used for Tobacco and Sheep farming. Most of the land is quite steep and would naturally be covered in Native Forest.

The Jacks Valley Carbon Project consists of two areas under permanent forest, (1) native and (2) exotic forest transitioning to native managed under continuous cover forestry (CCF). The native area occupies 5.2 hectares and the exotic transitioning to native managed under CCF area occupies 6.8 hectares. 

The exotic CCF forest is 20 years old and is being gradually replaced with native species. Once canopy openings are created by nature, a native will be planted in its place and overtime this will be fully transitioned to an indigenous forest.

All areas are registered as permanent forest to ensure harvesting is prevented for eternity. The native forest is fenced off and protected from most game animals such as wild pigs and deer. There are some beautiful Beech and Totora trees remain having survived being cleared in the past to make way for farming. The regrowth is dominated by Whitey wood and Kanuka.

The People

Andy and Rachael purchased Jacks Valley Farm in 2015 following their dream to establish an alternative lifestyle, live off grid, and be able to produce some of their own food from the land whilst conserving, protecting and developing its natural potential.

Andy and Rachael have reduced stock numbers to a handful, to allow the native forest to regenerate. Local Beekeepers are using the Kanuka flower to make beautiful creamy honey and it is common to see Weka, Kereru, Piwakawaka, Tui and Robins.

Their vision is to regenerate the native forest so that it becomes a haven of biodiversity.

Money from the ETS scheme is planned to be used to increase the forest area, extend the trapping lines, increase monitoring of those and improve fencing from deer and pigs on the outside boundaries.

The Location

The registered forest areas.

Technical Stuff

The Jacks Valley Carbon Project is registered with the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme. The project issues New Zealand Units (NZUs) based on New Zealand Government rules for carbon sequestration rates by indigenous forest.

Once the NZUs are sold to a carbon offset buyer, they are cancelled in the New Zealand carbon unit registry, so they cannot be used by (or sold to) anyone else.

Follow The Money

Conservation costs money. The main cost elements are:

  1. Conservation management costs. This includes pest and weed control, forest monitoring, and the administration of the carbon project (carbon returns, registry account management and general administration).

  2. Opportunity costs. This is the revenue that the landowner has given up to enable forest conservation to happen. In this project the landowner gave up revenue from pastoral farming - revenue that would normally be used to make a living off the land.

  3. Measurement, reporting and verification costs required for carbon offset certification to an international carbon standard.

When carbon credits are sold from this project the revenue goes to cover these costs.