South African Startup, Curbon to Offer Carbon-neutral Online Shopping Experience

With the debut of the nation’s first plugin made to aid in the battle against climate change, South African startup Curbon will enable carbon-neutral online purchasing with the aim of reducing carbon emissions.

With every online purchase, customers can take direct, significant climate action thanks to Curbon’s innovative solution. The startup’s flagship product calculates the emissions of customers’ carts at checkout and gives customers the ability to instantly offset the carbon footprint of their purchases on e-commerce sites using information from the top climate science universities in the world.

According to Mark Jones, co-founder and director of Curbon, consumers previously had very few alternatives for directly reducing the environmental effect of their purchases. “Curbon improves the sustainability of buying. For the first time in South Africa, Curbon enables a concrete financial commitment to climate projects as more consumers take the environment into account and expect more open and sustainable business practices from the businesses they support.

Curbon’s API employs carbon offsetting to lower and ultimately neutralize the carbon equivalent emissions of consumers’ online purchases as part of its objective to lessen the environmental impact of the entire e-commerce value chain.

This innovative product, a South African retail first, is integrated into the checkout process of Curbon’s partner e-commerce businesses and is also available for Shopify, WooCommerce, Magneto, and other platforms. Curbon calculates the emissions involved in the sales process, from the store to the end customer, as well as the full production process of goods and services, by combining hundreds of data points.

Additionally, carbon offsetting has emerged as a useful tool for reducing the environmental impact of current levels of consumerism by investing in climate projects that reduce emissions as online shopping continues to expand at a rapid rate and millions of consumers around the world click the checkout button.

“Consumers frequently lack the most up-to-date and accurate knowledge on climate change and the best ways to lessen its worst effects, compared to scientists and policymakers. Many people feel overpowered to the point of being hopeless when you factor in the understandable fear about climate change as a huge, complicated global issue. The potential to reduce one’s carbon footprint is a huge chance to take action to change the status quo because so much of today’s consumption is enabled online. Every act of carbon offsetting, no matter how tiny, makes a significant difference, according to Jones.

In addition to protecting the environment, the integration of the Curbon’s carbon neutral checkout to e-commerce provides retailers with a clearer route to sustainability while enhancing brand value and cultivating client loyalty. “It is becoming clearer how important sustainability is to consumers when making purchasing decisions. Customers want to support companies who share their concern for the environment and wish to act morally. In just two years, the South African internet retail market has more than doubled, and it will reach R30,2 billion in 2021. R150 million would be raised for the battle against climate change if only 20% of South Africans contributed 2-3% of the value of their online carts to carbon offsetting their purchases, adds Curbon co-founder and director Michael Pollock.

Despite painting a disconcerting picture of climate change, the most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report maintains that we can still lessen its worst effects if we act quickly. In addition, it predicts that at least 32 million people would experience extreme poverty as a result of climate change. Steffen Burrows, co-founder and director of Curbon, claims that climate change would only worsen inequality and the current bad economic situation that many developing countries, including South Africa, are facing. The evidence is clear: Although climate change threatens human and environmental health, there is still time to realize a sustainable, liveable future for all.

Curbon is a firm that focuses on climate fintech and addresses the effects of internet purchasing on the environment. In order to offset emissions at both the production and end-consumer consumption levels, Curbon will help to reduce the impact of carbon emissions by providing merchants and consumers with access to a tradeable permit.