CarbonCrop technology underpins innovative New Zealand native forest restoration partnership

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

2 July 2026

Photo Credit: Pamu, the Dr Warren Parker QEII Covenant

BNZ and Pāmu pioneer new approach to carbon and biodiversity funding for native forest restoration

The Bank of New Zealand and state-owned enterprise Pāmu announced on 23 June a joint initiative to support the restoration and biodiversity enhancement of established native forest leveraging carbon finance - with CarbonCrop providing the measurement, monitoring, and traceability infrastructure that enable long term integrity assurance.

The project centres on approximately 600 hectares of native forest on a Pāmu farm in northern Hawke's Bay, soon to be protected under a QEII covenant. Under a leasehold agreement, BNZ can recognise the land on its greenhouse gas balance sheet and use the ongoing carbon removals to help meet its emissions reduction goals, with Pāmu reinvesting lease income into ongoing forest and biodiversity restoration and protection activities on the land.

CarbonCrop CEO Nick Butcher says: "We’re excited by the potential of this model to expand the delivery of high-impact nature finance, with a particular focus on forest restoration initiatives that struggle to access funding under existing models. This project will have a real impact, and the approach is scalable. It’s also exciting for us at CarbonCrop internally, implementing all the integrity safeguards with BNZ and Pamu really let us showcase the capabilities of the systems and platform we’ve built over the last six years. We’re really grateful to Pamu and BNZ for believing a better way was possible, and doing the work to make it reality."

CarbonCrop's platform provides measurement, monitoring, allocation, and traceability services for the project's carbon removals. This ensures clarity and consistency in claims and accounting treatment across stakeholders, and supports compliance with relevant standards and integrity principles. The 600 hectares of established native forest includes a mix of regenerating and more mature areas, with the regenerating forest storing approximately 1,100 tonnes of additional carbon (CO2e) each year. The project is designed to adhere to relevant parts of the Greenhouse Gas Protocol standard family, the ISO 14064-1 standard, and the Toitū Envirocare Net Carbon Zero programme. The project outcomes will be subject to third party assurance as part of BNZ and Pāmu's respective sustainability reporting programmes. CarbonCrop's role includes long term monitoring, for the lease duration and beyond, giving all stakeholders an auditable record supporting related claims and ongoing integrity assurance processes.

This financing model addresses a gap in New Zealand's existing nature market. Ongoing carbon removals in native forests established before 1 January 1990 are not able to be recognised under the NZ ETS, and the recognition and monetisation of biodiversity outcomes in isolation is notoriously difficult. The result is that landowners often struggle to access finance and incentives to support the restoration and protection of their most valuable native forests - those areas with the highest carbon stocks and largest biodiversity potential. The BNZ-Pāmu model presents a template for expanded restoration financing through an accessible, scalable solution that leverages established, globally recognised standards, and delivers strong integrity safeguards.

About CarbonCrop

CarbonCrop is a New Zealand company building the operating system for forest restoration and land use change. Its platform connects landowners, restoration programmes, and carbon markets - providing the measurement, monitoring, and reporting infrastructure that makes land use change measurable, credible, and investable. To date, CarbonCrop has enabled over $35 million in carbon revenue to New Zealand landowners, assessed more than 4 million hectares of land, and supported the removal of over a million tonnes of carbon from the atmosphere.

ENDS

For media enquiries contact: Nick Butcher, nick.butcher@carboncrop.com