Thanks for your interesting response pjsherry – unfortunately it has cost me an hour or more as I read more on this very intriguing story! Here are a few things I found which will hopefully round the story out a little more:
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Gives his side of the story and talks about the journalist referred to by pjsherry.
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Sustainable Capital Group talk about being the first in Panama to receive VCS certification. This page has a link to details about the certification.
However, on the VCS Project Database [broken link removed] I can’t find the information about SCG, but this may be down to me searching incorrectly? Panama is not offered amongst the list of countries, and I have tried various keywords with no success.
There is an interesting report by CBRM & Merian Research, November 2010 here [broken link removed]
Small quote where Silva is mentioned “The case of Sterling Knight Consultants Ltd, London is particularly interesting. The company seems to be connected to Emerald Knight “Ethical Investments” and Silva Tree Panama SA, a firm that presents itself as “an environmental project developer with humanitarian, biodiversity and environmental benefits”. Neither Emerald Knight nor Silva Tree are known to be members of European social investments forums or environmental coalitions.” There is quite a long section on Sterling Knight, with more mentions of Silva Tree.
Maurice Sjerps is a name mentioned in the report linked above, and there is a story here about a man named Sjerps, believed to have first name Maurice, who was recently arrested in Panama on suspicion of defrauding foreign investors with a teak scheme. Perhaps this is a different Maurice Sjerps?
All of this makes me a little uneasy, I have to say, and I think it strange that Silva Tree deleted their posts in this thread – with the explanation “project finalised”. But there may well be perfectly reasonable explanations. I do hope everything works out well for you.
