Biochartrust is focused on small-scale biochar projects conducted in developing countries, in which the production of the crops is devoted to the farmers' families or the local market.
Typically, a farmer or a small cooperative wishes to apply biochar on (part of) their gardens or fields but lack the fundings to buy all the inputs, prepare the soil, irrigate and cultivate the area properly. Biochartrust comes here into play by allowing donators living somewhere else in the world to contribute financially to the projects.

Biochartrust selects the participating farmers with the help of its network of local partners (NGOs, institutions, etc.) who better know the context and can identify the most reliable and motivated farmers. Another requirement is that they have easy access to the phone and/or internet and can be reached easily to give update on their projects. A selection of "best projects" with special rewards for the winning farmers will also be regularly organized through the website of Biochartrust.

It is crucial to guarantee that the production of charcoal used as biochar by the sponsored farmers does not contribute to the deforestation and/or increase the pollution of the local environment. Unfortunately, in most developing countries today, charcoal is still produced from non-renewable biomass sources and with traditional methods (e.g. earth mound kilns) that are inefficient and harmful to the environment.

Biochartrust promotes therefore as far as possible alternative methods for biochar production, that have been improved to be more efficient and to be used with renewable biomass (e.g. rice husks, cotton stems) as feedstock. When no such device is available but farmers are motivated to perform biochar trials, Biochrtrust determines with them the best solution according to their context and capacity and add the price for the construction of the decided technology in the price for the project. A small biochar cookstove for one household can be as cheap as a few US dollars, while a pyrolyzer for a large production can reach several thousands US dollars. A list of available biochar production technologies can be consulted online.

In order to maximize the success of the sponsored projects, Biochartrust works systematically with local partners such as NGOs or consultants that are qualified to monitore such projects in the specific regions and environments of the candidate farmers.

These local partners have the responsibility to help farmers manage the money given by the sponsors, implement properly the projects and meet the objectives and schedule initially planned.

On the other hand, they also have the duty to guide farmers to more autonomy and to build capacity for self-management so that farmers can soon handle their projects themselves in a responsible way without external support.

Whatsoever, these partners will control the development of every project and send frequent feedbacks to Biochartrust which will update accordingly the projects webpages. Biochartrust will, in turn, regularly control its local partners to make sure of their entire reliability.

In the very unprobable case that a sponsored project can finally not be implemented (e.g. unexpected climatic event, change of residence of the farmer), Biochartrust reserves the right to use the money given by the sponsors to other projects. Of course, the sponsors will be notified and redirected to the webpages of the new projects supported by their donation.