Now there are two!

The arrival of CarbonLink, the RCS scheme to sell soil carbon, to join Christine Jones's soil carbon accreditation scheme is good news for everyone. It means we are closer to the day when soil carbon takes its rightful place alongside forests as a tradeable commodity.

In both cases there are still a lot of questions about the engine room of any soil trading scheme: measurement, monitoring and verification. If anything, attitudes to this aspect of carbon trading are hardening.

The Carbon Coalition favours Transparency - one of the foundation principles of Carbon Trading.

Our advice to all landholders considering trading in soil carbon remains the same:

1. Not all of your property is likely to be ideal for sequestration. Flatter,more even areas are ideal.

2. Baseline measure those parts of your property. But don't commit all your appropriate land to a single scheme. Different schemes are likely to have different conditions and requirements. You need to build flexibility into your arrangements.

3. Risk management: you are making yourself liable for requests to reimburse should carbon sequestered subsequently be lost. Be sure you have insurance, escape clauses, recovery provisions, make good arrangements that suit you.

4. 100 years or 70 years is a long time to manage land to maintain a level of carbon. How realistic are your expectations?

Your best defence is knowledge.