Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, Mexican President, has called for regulation of the country’s carbon offset market in response to the investigation which showed that oil giant BP Plc is paying subsistence farmers a fraction of market rate.

The British Petroleum has reportedly only paid $4 per ton to more than a dozen Mexican communities under an agreement signed in 2021.

“Yes, of course,” my administration would also look into BP’s project for paying “too little” said Lopez Obrador on if the market needed regulation to ensure better pay for landowners.

The next day of the investigation, government officials met with carbon offset standards bodies and called for a “just distribution of benefits.”

However, members of community in Coatitila have been told that BP would be increasing their pay. Pronatura, which runs the project for BP, said they will use a model where the oil giant takes a cut of market rate and the rest goes to the community, but declined to give specific figures.

The oil giant has found out a climate bargain in some of Mexico’s poorest areas, paying a fraction of market rate for carbon offsets to rural villagers working to protect their forests. However, each offset should equal a ton of carbon absorbed.

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