SINGAPORE: Singapore is seeing an increase of carbon trading companies setting up in the country.
Key players such as Tricorona and Gazprom, the world's leading traders of carbon, are the latest to come into the market. The tally of such companies currently total 30, compared to only a few couple of years ago.
The Singapore government supports the industry by providing grants to companies – grants help defray the cost of developing the documentation needed for carbon credit projects that are certified by the United Nations under its Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) scheme. Singapore has also improved its scope of tax incentives in 2009 to include such activities.
The global carbon trading market is predicted to increase in value from about €90 billion €90 billion (NZ$164.4 billion) in 2008 to nearly €1.2 trillion (NZ$2.2 trillion) by 2020.
Such increased activity may see demand transfer to regional or domestic markets – New Zealand has its own carbon trading system in place, while countries like Japan and South Korea are in the process of doing so which may further promote trading in Asia-Pacific.
Source: The Straits Times
