The Climate, Community & Biodiversity Standards, usually called the CCB Standards, assess how land management projects address climate, local communities and biodiversity. They do not issue carbon units on their own. Instead, projects commonly combine CCB certification with a carbon standard such as the Verified Carbon Standard.
What CCB adds to carbon certification
A carbon methodology focuses on quantifying greenhouse gas outcomes. CCB adds a structured assessment of stakeholder participation, land rights, community impacts, biodiversity conditions and safeguards.
Projects describe the baseline for people and ecosystems, identify potential positive and negative impacts and define monitoring indicators. Independent auditors then assess whether the design meets the standard and whether reported outcomes occurred.
Validation and verification
Validation reviews the project design before or near implementation. Verification examines actual performance during a monitoring period. A project can therefore have a strong plan at validation and still need to demonstrate delivery later.
Buyers should distinguish between a project that is seeking CCB validation, one that has completed validation and one with verified community or biodiversity results.
What co-benefit claims require
Statements such as "protects biodiversity" or "supports local livelihoods" should be tied to measurable indicators. Examples include habitat condition, species monitoring, income distribution, access to services, participation in governance and grievance resolution.
The quality of the evidence matters. A large list of Sustainable Development Goals is not the same as verified outcomes.
How buyers can use CCB information
CCB documentation can deepen due diligence by showing who is affected, how benefits are shared and what ecological risks the project manages. It can also identify unresolved tenure, participation or leakage issues that a carbon calculation alone may not reveal.
Our carbon credit sourcing approach combines standard and registry checks with project-level review of safeguards, stakeholders and delivery evidence.
