Africa’s Top Exchange to Trade Carbon Offsets Within Two Months

(Bloomberg) -- JSE Ltd., which operates Africa’s biggest stock and bond exchanges, will start trading carbon offsets within two months. 

The Johannesburg-based company in October formed a partnership with Xpansiv Ltd., which provides infrastructure to trade what it calls environmental commodities such as carbon credits and renewable energy certificates. 

“We have had at least five sellers wanting to register,” JSE’s Chief Executive Officer Leila Fourie said in an interview on Monday. “We expect that the first credits to be issued will be around April and May.”

While South Africa is not the continent’s biggest producer of carbon credits, it is the region’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases. With the country gradually increasing a carbon tax, the market for offsets is set to surge. The nation is also Africa’s biggest producer of solar and wind power.

The credits to be initially traded are tied to forestry and farming projects that absorb carbon from the atmosphere, Fourie said. 

A single carbon credit is equivalent to a ton of climate warming carbon dioxide or its equivalent either removed from the atmosphere or prevented from entering it in the first place. They are bought by emitters of greenhouse gases to offset their activities.

The global carbon credits market may reach $1 trillion annually from about $2 billion today, according to BloombergNEF estimates. 

JSE is in talks with two other African exchanges to collaborate on trading the offsets using the platform the South African exchange has put in place. 

“Our vision certainly is to expand to create a pan-African venture or pan-African infrastructure,” she said. “Carbon sellers in each of the countries could register their carbon credits and those would be available to South Africans or to, for example, Kenyans.”

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