Three routes into the LSR Standard
The GHG Protocol Land Sector and Removals (LSR) Standard takes effect on 1 January 2027. It sets the rules for how companies account for emissions and CO₂ removals from land.
Owning or managing farmland is one route into it. Buying, processing or selling significant amounts of food, fibre, feed or bioenergy is another, and that route catches food and beverage companies, CPG brands, retailers and their suppliers who hold no land at all. Reporting CO₂ removals in any year is a third.
The question we hear most often is: does this actually apply to us? Requirement 1 answers it, and it comes down to two judgements. Whether you report in conformance with the GHG Protocol, and whether your land sector activities are significant to your inventory. Companies that decide those activities are insignificant carry an obligation of their own: they have to disclose that position and justify it.
FLAG sits alongside this. The LSR Standard governs accounting. SBTi FLAG governs target setting. The LSR Standard applies to companies reporting a GHG inventory in conformance with the GHG Protocol. FLAG applies to companies holding or seeking SBTi-validated targets. A FLAG target requires base year emissions calculated in line with the LSR Standard, so every company with a FLAG target is doing LSR accounting. Plenty of companies sit inside the LSR Standard and outside FLAG.
Check where your company stands
The tool below takes five minutes. It asks about your reporting, your operations and value chain, your removals, and your SBTi position, then tells you whether the LSR Standard applies to your inventory and whether a FLAG target comes with it.
Read more
If the LSR Standard applies to you and you want the full picture, start with The Land Sector and Removals Standard: a new rulebook for land emissions. It covers the four land emission subcategories, the traceability ladder, the 20-year land use change window, removals and safeguards, and what changes in a Scope 1, 2 and 3 inventory.
If your team already worked with the September 2022 draft guidance, go to The Land Sector and Removals Standard: what changed from the 2022 draft. It tracks the requirements that moved between the draft and the final Standard, and what needs recalculating.
Talk it through with a Terrascope expert
Frequently asked questions
Who does the LSR Standard apply to?
Any company reporting a corporate GHG inventory in conformance with the GHG Protocol that has significant land sector activities in its operations or value chain, and any company that reports CO₂ removals or CO₂ capture with geologic storage in the current year or reported them in a previous year. The intended audience includes companies that own or control significant areas of land, companies that purchase, consume, process or sell significant amounts of food, fibre, feed, bioenergy or other agricultural products, companies supplying significant amounts of products to agricultural producers, and companies managing land to increase carbon stored in biomass or soil.
What counts as a significant land sector activity?
The GHG Protocol sets no numeric threshold and makes no recommendation as to what constitutes a significant exclusion threshold, so the judgement rests with the reporting company. Some programmes set their own figures; SBTi's 20% is the example the Standard itself gives. A company that treats its land sector activities as insignificant is required to disclose and justify that position, and the justification needs to hold up to assurance.
Do I need an SBTi FLAG target if the LSR Standard applies to me?
These are separate tests. A FLAG target is required for companies in the designated sectors (forest and paper products, food production from agriculture, food production from animal sources, food and beverage processing, food and staples retailing, tobacco) and for companies in any other sector whose FLAG-related emissions are 20% or more of gross scope 1, 2 and 3. Companies below that threshold are recommended to set one anyway. Where a company declines, its land-related emissions sit inside the energy and industry target boundary, where FLAG removals stay uncounted.
Does the LSR Standard cover forestry?
Version 1 covers agriculture and CO₂ removal technologies. Forestry and non-productive land uses sit outside it for now. Version 1 does cover biomass carbon stock changes on productive agricultural land including agroforestry and silvopasture, conversion of natural forest to plantation forest, and land management production emissions from activities on forest land.
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