WithOneSeed’s answer is simple yet transformative: a community forestry model that enables smallholder farmers to grow and protect trees on their own land, rewarding them directly for every living tree.
Co-authored by WithOneSeed and Gold Standard
Across Timor-Leste, decades of forest loss and limited livelihood options have left hillsides bare, soils eroded, and water sources diminished. Around 80% of disadvantaged Timorese households rely on small-scale, rain-fed agriculture for food and income (World Bank, 2024). Yet with shifting weather patterns and degraded land even this is becoming harder to sustain.
As forests disappear, so do the ecosystems that sustain rural life, leading to longer dry seasons, reduced crop yields, and growing pressure to clear more land for fuelwood and survival.
This local reality reflects a global crisis. Worldwide, we are losing 10 million hectares of forest every year, an area the size of Portugal (FAO, 2020). For smallholder farming families in Timor-Leste, climate instability is not a distant threat, it is already here.
The challenge is urgent, shorter wet seasons, erratic rainfall, and increasingly landslide-prone slopes are disrupting lives and livelihoods.
How do we protect and restore forests while supporting the communities who depend on them?
A FARMER-FIRST MODEL
WithOneSeed’s answer is simple yet transformative: a community forestry model that enables smallholder farmers to grow and protect trees on their own land, rewarding them directly for every living tree.
Through the Ho Musan Ida model, more than 1,200 farmers across Baguia are creating a mosaic of new community forests across deforested and degraded landscapes. Individually, smallholders could not access global carbon markets, but by pooling their trees and data, they can participate fairly and transparently.
The solution is simple but powerful: a farmer-first model that sends most revenue back to communities and uses fit-for-purpose technology to track every trees survival. With clear rules, transparent agreements, and locally led operations, carbon income becomes a reliable, predictable incentive to keep trees alive and forests thriving.
Smallholder farmers can lead climate action by providing this global service; planting trees, protecting forests, and stewarding their land. Their efforts generate global benefits: sequestering carbon, protecting biodiversity, restoring water systems, and strengthening food and climate security. The challenge isn’t their willingness, it’s creating fair, transparent systems that pay them for what they protect and restore.
By linking communities to the voluntary carbon market, using high-integrity standards like Gold Standard, and returning income directly to farmers, we can move toward real climate justice. This isn’t charity. It is fair payment for smallholder farmer’s efforts.
This approach transforms restoration into a household asset, strengthens resilience at the village level, and channels private finance into where it is often overlooked; remote rural communities where forest stewardship matters most.
A STORY ROOTED IN COMMUNITY
WithOneSeed began in 2009 in the mountainous subdistrict of Baguia, Timor-Leste, with 12 farmers and a simple idea: pay people fairly to plant and care for trees on their own land.
Today, 914 farmers across 10 villages manage almost half a million trees across eight native and naturalised species, supplied by local nurseries. More than 80% of all carbon income stays in Timor-Leste, funding farmer payments, employing 46 local staff and supporting delivery by local partner Foundation Ho Musan Ida.
Integrity and transparency have been strengthened by TreeO2, a digital monitoring and verification platform co-developed by xpand Foundation and the community. Each tree is tagged, geolocated and recorded, linking verified data directly to carbon credit issuance and farmer payments. This ensures full traceability from seedling to credit, giving confidence to both local participants and global buyers.
“The HoMusanIda (WithOneSeed in English) program in Baguia, Timor-Leste, has created new opportunities for our community by planting trees on our own land. Through this program, we pass knowledge from the older generation to the new, helping them value the forest as our supermarket, our pharmacy, our life library, and the heart of the planet.”
— Leopoldina Guterres, Community Leader and Director of Foundation Ho Musan Ida, Baguia, Timor-Leste”
IMPACT AND BENEFITS
Since 2009, the WithOneSeed model has helped restore degraded land, stabilise soils, safeguard water sources and draw measurable volumes of carbon from the atmosphere.
More than 80% of the programme’s income flows directly into participating communities. Annual payments for verified tree survival provide steady, earned income that strengthens household economies and supports village priorities, from small enterprises to education to infrastructure. Diverse local enterprises have grown including ecotrekking services and visitor accommodation, food-preservation ventures, and solar home-lighting services, each adding value to village economies and improving quality of life.
Some of the projects benefits to date:
- 914 farming households engaged in community forestry
- 469,288 trees under management
- 112,618 tCO2e removed from the global atmosphere
- US$3.9M paid into the Baguia village economy since 2010
The program’s integrity is independently verified and holds an AA rating from BeZero, placing WithOneSeed in the top 2% of carbon projects, globally. Gold Standard certification ensures rigorous carbon accounting,
Beyond finance, the success of the programme has enabled WithOneSeed to influence policy by working closely with the Timor-Leste government, creating an enabling environment for sustainable land management and long-term climate solutions.
“When we pay farmers fairly for every tree they plant and keep alive, forests return and livelihoods improve. This is not charity for rural subsistence communities; it’s a fair partnership in climate action. Our innovative digital community-forestry management tool, TreeO2, provides transparent, auditable data on every tree in the program and the carbon it sequesters for the global market, so every credit carries trust from the farmer to the buyer. Each WithOneSeed carbon credit purchased creates income for farmers, funds rural youth employment, stimulates village-based enterprise, builds critical community infrastructure, and creates living forests that protect water, soils, and livelihoods.”
— Amy Stevenson, CEO, xpand Foundation
YOUR SUPPORT MATTERS
Smallholder farmers on the frontlines of climate change in Timor-Leste are leading local climate action that delivers global impact by regenerating forests, restoring ecosystems, and building resilience and stronger futures for their communities.
By purchasing WithOneSeed Gold Standard carbon credits, you make a direct, transparent investment in community-led climate solutions. This is not aid; it is fair payment for genuine climate stewardship.
Simple Action. Many People. Big Impact.
About xpand
xpand Foundation is an Australian non-profit organisation with a mission to bring bold, regenerative ideas to life alongside those most affected by climate change and economic disadvantage. Guided by the principles of collaboration, community-led innovation, and care for future generations, xpand co-designs practical solutions that restore ecosystems, strengthen local economies, and support communities to lead with their own ideas.
sources
FAO (2020). Global Forest Resources Assessment: https://openknowledge.fao.org/server/api/core/bitstreams/9f24d451-2e56-4ae2-8a4a-1bc511f5e60e/content
Making Agriculture Work for the Poor in Timor-Leste- World Bank (2024). https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/server/api/core/bitstreams/cf09c2da-02d8-45bd-bfc8-8f72d10e652d/content