Forest Carbon's directors are (L) James Hepburne Scott and (R) Stephen Prior, pictured above at a project site in Northumberland.

James, who has many years' experience in the agricultural trading and finance sectors is also a tree nursery director, farmer and forester. As Scottish Chairman of the Forestry and Timber Association (now part of ConFor) he has long been involved in the lobbying of government for greater support for UK forestry.

Stephen, a former secondary school headmaster, discovered a second vocation in climate change mitigation through his Durham University MBA dissertation (a study of environmental economics and carbon emissions trading). His findings, which he presented at the 2005 UN Climate Change Conference in Montreal, convinced him of the importance of trees in the wider quest to deal with the world's unavoidable greenhouse gas emissions.