In the shade of the trees

WOZ | 5 February 2026

In the shade of the trees

A St. Gallen-based investment firm promises to combine climate protection, development aid, and returns with a project in Ethiopia. But a local community is raising the alarm

By Jennifer Steiner and Anina Ritscher

More and more faces gradually appear, soon twenty tiles fill the screen. "The trees are a great worry for us," says Ob Omot. Every week, members of the Nyikaani community like Omot gather digitally via video call. Some of them live in the USA, others have stayed behind: in the Gambela region, in the remote west of Ethiopia, on the border with South Sudan.

For months, one topic has dominated these transcontinental discussions of the Nyikaani Community Council: the twenty million trees, primarily eucalyptus and acacia, that a Swiss company plans to plant in their homeland. The reforestation project is intended to contribute to global climate protection by having the newly planted trees absorb and store CO₂. The promise for the local population: jobs, locally grown food, and improved infrastructure in a neglected region. But at this virtual Nyikaani meeting, one thing is palpable above all: concern.

Besides a state-run, regulated market, there is also a voluntary, private market for CO₂ certificates. The value of both markets now exceeds one trillion US dollars. The private market, in particular, has been booming for years. Those who buy certificates can offset emissions in one location by reducing them in another, for example, by preventing deforestation.

However, forest conservation projects have repeatedly been embroiled in scandals in the recent past, such as the Kariba project by the Zurich-based company South Pole, which saved fewer emissions than claimed (see WOZ No. 9/23 ). A new generation of investors and project developers is therefore looking for alternatives – and is increasingly focusing on reforestation: Between 2021 and 2024, the number of such projects worldwide tripled.

Planting takes place instead of preservation – and genuine climate protection is promised with high returns.

From savannah to forest

Among the most ambitious players in the reforestation market are several Swiss companies, including ASC Impact GmbH, founded in 2021. The company, located in a stately old building in St. Gallen's museum quarter, plans to eventually invest 400 million euros in agricultural and forestry projects south of the Sahara. Its business model: ASC Impact leases large areas of land, plants trees, has food produced – for the local market, as the company emphasizes – and simultaneously generates certificates for the global CO₂ market. These certificates are then marketed to investors, such as the government of the United Arab Emirates.

Behind ASC Impact are Swiss national Christian Winkler, a former Credit Suisse banker and venture capitalist; entrepreneur Matthias Schulz; and the Kirchmayer family, who have been involved in forestry in Eastern Europe for decades and now want to tap into new markets in Africa. "We pay nothing for the land there," explained Managing Director Karl Kirchmayer in an interview. In Ethiopia, this means about sixty cents per hectare per year, a fraction of what a lease would cost in Western or even Eastern Europe. According to the company, ASC Impact plans to invest in a total of 150,000 hectares of land there, as well as in Angola and the Republic of Congo. In Gambela in western Ethiopia alone, the company intends to lease 27,000 hectares – an area three times the size of the canton of Zurich. They plan to convert part of this area, which currently consists of savanna and bushland, into forest.

In 2024, ASC Impact signed a lease agreement and a social contract with representatives of local authorities and the government. Since then, the company has been using these agreements to attract investors, promising them a 20 percent annual return. Among others, it has secured the German search engine Ecosia, which positions itself as a green alternative to Google, for the project.

But in Gambela, the reforestation project has put the Nyikaani Community Council on high alert: "We saw pictures of the contract signing on social media and only learned about the project that way," says Ob Omot in a video call. They still don't know exactly which areas are to be reforested and fear being displaced. The man in his mid-forties spends half the year in Minnesota and the other half in Ethiopia. His fiancée and two children live in Gambela. The ASC Impact project borders the village where Omot grew up; there is neither public infrastructure nor cell phone reception. The mostly well-educated council members in the cities and abroad therefore see themselves as the voice of those who have remained there.

This also applies to B. O., who wishes to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals. "We don't know what the government and the company have agreed upon or what consequences the project will have for us," says O., who lives in the regional capital and regularly visits his relatives south of the project area. So far, they have neither been informed about the timeline nor have they been able to review the contract. "Many people in the villages are confused and therefore reject the project," he says.

A bridge as a promise

The community's concern is so great also because the region has already been used as an investment project for foreign companies – leaving the local population empty-handed. Following the global financial and food crisis of 2007/08, the Ethiopian government – in Ethiopia, only the state owns land – promised international companies easy access to fertile land to establish agricultural plantations. "Gambela became the center of this development," says Asebe Regassa Debelo, a human geographer and East Africa expert at the University of Zurich. The central government declared vast tracts of land in the region "empty" and lured hundreds of agricultural companies into the country with favorable lease prices and tax breaks.

The government hoped to attract money to Ethiopia, but both agricultural yields and profits flowed to China or Europe. And the local population, for whom the land was a livelihood and by no means empty, was forced to abandon fields and pastures and relocate to villages. The narrative of "unused land" remains a political tool to this day, says Regassa Debelo. "But just because no one lives there permanently doesn't mean the land is unused."

Ob Omot from the Community Council confirms this: "Due to the lack of infrastructure, even after the resettlement, the villagers have nothing but the land where they have hunted and fished for generations." Moreover, this land has spiritual value because their ancestors are buried there. Furthermore, existing tensions between population groups could escalate. In Gambela, the Anuak, to whom the Nyikaani belong, have been fighting the Nuer group for decades for access to land and political representation – sometimes resorting to violence.

Alexander Meckelburg, a social anthropologist at the University of Bern who has been researching Gambela for years, warns that "any indication that the Anuak people might lose their land" triggers fears of displacement. These fears repeatedly erupt into violence. "Thus, Gambela is constantly drawn into new conflict dynamics." It is therefore crucial that companies engage more deeply with the region.

ASC Impact insists it is doing exactly that. "Drone footage and satellite images clearly show that there is neither livestock farming nor arable land on this piece of land," says co-founder Matthias Schulz, referring to a commissioned study. Assessments of the area's cultural value are still underway, and the company insists it will not go anywhere it is not welcome. For years, the company has been in discussions with local officials and individual villagers who welcome the project and have contractually guaranteed their approval. The deputy head of the Gog district, for example, where the forest is to be built, says that people want the project because the infrastructure is urgently needed.

ASC's most important promise: a bridge over the Gilo River, which separates the Gog district from the nearest town. For the local representative, the project can't start soon enough. Schulz puts things into perspective: a large-scale consultation with various population groups in the villages surrounding the project area is still pending. Only if this consultation also yields positive results will the project proceed. They first had to secure the land lease contractually in order to attract investors, and only then could they invest in expensive consultation processes.

But after the initial contract signing, almost nothing happened for two years. During this time, uncertainty grew within the Nyikaani Community Council. Only after an initial confrontation by the WOZ newspaper in September 2025 did ASC Impact contact the council chairman and 26 people from five villages and begin formal consultations. "We didn't meet a single person who didn't want the project," Schulz summarizes.

Silence or agreement

Further confusion is caused by a protocol the company prepared after a phone call in November with the council chairman. It states that he supports the project. However, several council members told WOZ that they only learned of the call afterward and that they continue to oppose the project. The chairman could not be reached by press time

B. O. and Ob Omot remain skeptical for other reasons as well. If a project is desired by the government, they have only two options: silence or agreement. Otherwise, they have to expect intimidation from the authorities – which is why it is primarily the diaspora that voices its criticism publicly. Social anthropologist Meckelburg says: "Political decisions made by the central government in Addis Ababa and implemented by the regional administration, for example regarding large investment projects, are often not explained in detail in the villages of Gambela, the poorest region of Ethiopia." Even if the consultations were to result in a negative outcome, Meckelburg believes the government would still want to implement the project.

It remains to be seen whether history will repeat itself in Gambela, or whether ASC will actually build the promised bridge, create jobs, and share the profits with the local population. It is equally unclear how the project will affect the complex relationships between the local communities. The climate benefits also ultimately remain questionable: forests grow slowly, alter ecosystems, and are vulnerable to fire and deforestation.

While some hope the investments will bring growth and prosperity, others don't trust this narrative – and fear being overlooked and pushed aside once again. The underlying conflict goes far beyond Gambela: To combat a climate catastrophe caused by the North, land is being claimed in the South. And profits and CO₂ certificates flow back to where the capital originated.

Source: https://farmlandgrab.org/post/33294-in-the-shade-of-the-trees