October 2, 2026
More than 30
members of Indigenous communities from Biliqo Bulesa in
Kenya have filed a lawsuit against a carbon credit project
on their land run by the Northern Rangelands Trust
(NRT).
The Northern Kenya Rangelands Carbon Project
(NKRCP) is one of the world’s largest soil carbon offset
schemes and has sold credits to companies including Netflix,
Meta, British Airways, and Beiersdorf, the owner of
Nivea.
This is the second lawsuit by Indigenous
communities against NRT, and the first directly challenging
its carbon project, and reflects the growing resistance to
the organization, its partners and funders.
“NRT is
reducing local leaders to symbolic bystanders to fake
community consent for carbon markets. Ancestral lands are
commercialised for global offsets while NRT retains
absolute, opaque control over all generated funds,” the
local human rights activist Jilo Buke Said told Survival.
“The carbon credit project is systematically diminishing the
lives and survival of pastoralists, trading their ancestral
heritage and daily existence for the corporate and
institutional interests of NRT.”
The plaintiffs are
claiming back control over their own lands, demanding
accountability from NRT and full transparency on the carbon
project funds.
Biliqo Bulesa is one part of NRT’s
so-called “Community Conservancies,” established on land
used by Indigenous pastoralists for generations. The
plaintiffs say that NRT converted their land into a
conservancy and enrolled it in the carbon project without
their free, prior, and informed consent (FPIC), generating
millions in revenue from the sale of carbon credits. They
request transparent information about the money derived from
indigenous lands, and say that NRT “hijacked” Indigenous
conservation practices. The plaintiffs further argue that
NRT controlled grazing, restricted pastoral livelihoods, and
deployed armed rangers accused of intimidation, harassment,
and violence.
Advertisement – scroll to continue reading
Last month, over 60 Indigenous people
from around the world gathered in Kenya and called
out conservation and carbon projects, which steal their
lands and attack their livelihoods. Addressing NRT, they
demanded “leave our lands and respect our
rights”.
Caroline Pearce, Director of Survival
International, said: “These plaintiffs and their lawyers
are standing firm despite threats and intimidation. They are
showing that real climate justice is about them – and not
NRT and multi-million-dollar CO2 deals. Anyone tempted to
buy credits from this project in an attempt to act
‘climate neutral’ should ask themselves: Am I paying for
the climate – or for a fraudulent label on stolen
land?”
Notes:
- The NKRCP
has faced long-standing criticism from both Indigenous
people and experts. Survival International’s 2023 report
Blood
Carbon described the project as a greenwash with
devastating impacts for Indigenous herders. - In 2025,
the Environment and Land Court at Isiolo, Kenya ruled that
Biliqo Bulesa Community Conservancy itself and another NRT
conservancy were established
illegally and unconstitutionally. The appeal to that
case is ongoing. The new case is being brought in the
same court (ELCEPPET/E004/2026) and directly challenges
NRT’s carbon project. - The sale of NKRCP carbon
credits by the notorious U.S. certification body Verra had
already been suspended twice, following Survival’s
report and a second time following the 2025
ruling. - The plaintiffs also worry that the Biliqo
Bulesa Conservancy received funding also from international
donors, including the European Union, USAID, and the Danish
development agency DANIDA, despite operating unlawfully on
Indigenous
lands.
