Story and Photos from Dr Anneke Trux, Head of Programmes at GIZ

Soil organic carbon credits can help smallholder farmers improve food security, restore degraded land, and strengthen climate resilience while generating additional income. Drawing on experiences from Kenya’s ProSoil program, the article highlights the potential of sustainable land management to increase soil health and carbon storage. It also stresses the need for transparent carbon markets, affordable monitoring systems, strong partnerships, and fair benefit-sharing to ensure lasting environmental and social impact.

The Global Climate-Smart Agriculture (CSA) Conference is more than a knowledge exchange platform; it is a platform to incite climate action in agriculture. Immediately preceding the UN Climate Conference (UNFCCC COP30) taking place in Belem, Brazil, organizers of the 2025 CSA conference saw this year’s assembly as a critical opportunity to align on the future of food and agriculture ahead of COP30.

As an organization with action as a primary tenet, the Coalition of Action 4 Soil Health (CA4SH) was invited to co-chair the Soil Health and Plant Nutrition thematic session with partners from the International Fertilizer Development Center (IFDC). The session comprised two sub-sessions on 5th and 6th November, dedicated to finance and technology, respectively. Below, we summarize the innovations and key messages shared in these sessions, and chart a way forward for soil health at COP.