# What share of carbon credit money should reach the farmer?

Canonical: https://senseible.earth/answers/farmer-share-of-carbon-credit-revenue

Verra's rules set no percentage. Its VCS Standard v5.0 makes projects that affect land or resource rights holders design a benefit-sharing plan with them, show projected revenues and costs up front, and report costs and revenue every year. Judge an offer by that disclosure, not by a headline percentage.

## What VCS Standard v5.0 requires

- The benefit-sharing plan is designed jointly with the rights holders before the project starts and runs for the project's life.
- When designing it, participants are shown projected revenues and expected costs.
- Every year after that, they get operating costs and gross or projected revenues.
- The plan names each benefit, cash or in kind, and when it is paid, and allows for change, such as lower revenue when credit prices fall.
- The project activity itself is not a benefit. Trees planted under the project, for example, do not count.

## When it applies

Verra issued VCS Standard v5.0 on 16 December 2025. Its stakeholder and benefit-sharing sections are required for projects that start on or after 1 July 2027; version 4.7 stays active until then. For an earlier project, the contract is the only place the terms live.

## How to judge an offer

- Ask for the revenue and cost lines behind the share, not just the percentage.
- Ask how the share moves if verification cuts the volume or the price drops.
- Ask who pays the verifier, the issuance levy and retirement fees.
- Value seed, kilns or training separately from cash.
- Get the payment dates in writing.

## What Senseible does here

Senseible's field app records each farmer's consent with the date, method, agent and consent text version, and keeps field records under a pseudonymous id, so yearly reporting to farmers can point to their own batches.

- [When farmers get paid](https://senseible.earth/answers/how-do-farmers-get-paid-carbon-credits-india)
- [Recording farmer consent](https://senseible.earth/answers/farmer-consent-carbon-project-data)
- [Carbon removal projects](https://senseible.earth/carbon-removal/projects)

Sources: [Verra, VCS Standard, v5.0 (16 December 2025): Sections 3.6, 3.17 and 4.1](https://verra.org/documents/vcs-standard-v5-0/), [Verra, VCS Program Details: rules, versions and effective dates (v4 documents active until 1 July 2027)](https://verra.org/programs/verified-carbon-standard/vcs-program-details/)

Last reviewed 2026-11-02.