Consultant on Carbon Credit Pathways for Urban and Peri-Urban Agriculture in Curitiba

Role Overview

You will provide hands-on technical assistance to selected Brazilian municipalities and states, supporting the TEEBAgriFood initiative in integrating urban and peri-urban agriculture (UPA) into climate and environmental policy. Your day-to-day work involves analysing existing legal and policy instruments, identifying where carbon and ecosystem service goals can be woven into local governance, and designing practical frameworks that decision-makers can adopt. This role matters because it directly helps cities like Curitiba move from pilot projects to durable, legally sound mechanisms for carbon credits and nature-based solutions.

Key Responsibilities

• Support selected municipalities and state-level actors in applying TEEBAgriFood approaches, offering targeted technical input on policy design and implementation.
• Map and analyse cross-sectoral policies influencing urban and peri-urban agriculture at municipal and state levels, pinpointing entry points, gaps, and realistic paths for policy integration.
• Work with local stakeholders to adapt proposed legal and policy instruments so they fit the political and institutional realities of each municipality and meet legal standards.
• Collect and organise project data from urban agriculture initiatives that include a carbon component — such as composting, rock dust, biochar, and soil amendments — including costs, investment needs, revenues, and operational metrics.
• Measure four carbon stocks (above-ground biomass, below-ground biomass, dead organic matter, and soil carbon) at urban and peri-urban sites in Curitiba that use agroecological and biodiverse systems such as agroforestry.
• Compare measured carbon stocks against a business-as-usual baseline to estimate the CO₂ removal potential and assess feasibility for carbon credit generation.
• Draft the structure for a municipal market for environmental assets, covering carbon and the full range of ecosystem services, aligned with both national and municipal policy frameworks.
• Feed findings into the ongoing revision of Curitiba’s Municipal Climate Plan, ensuring the proposed market approach is practical and actionable.

Requirements & Qualifications

• Advanced university degree (Master’s or higher) in Environmental Science, Environmental Economics, or a closely related field. A bachelor’s degree plus two additional years of qualifying professional experience will also be accepted.
• Minimum two years of demonstrated professional experience in carbon market assessment and carbon analysis, including direct work on measurement, valuation, or market feasibility.
• In-depth knowledge of Brazil’s institutional, political, and regulatory context for environmental asset markets, with specific understanding of how such markets function at federal, state, and municipal levels.
• Strong working knowledge of the governance landscape, policy processes, and institutional architecture of the Municipality of Curitiba; experience working in Curitiba and its surrounding biome is considered an advantage.
• Solid grasp of climate change, nature-based solutions, ecosystem services, and human–nature relationships, with the ability to apply these concepts to local policy design.
• Capacity to work autonomously, accurately, and under pressure in a fast-moving environment, managing multiple competing tasks across teams and engaging stakeholders through participatory methods.
• Ability to convert technical and scientific evidence from biophysical and environmental-economic assessments into clear, accessible, policy-relevant recommendations for decision-makers.