Dear donors and supporters,
In this opportunity we want to share with you our progress by providing some links to recent actions with our two reserves in relation to restoration, plant nursery activities and more, and telling you about a new project coming which includes a forest festival to spread awareness.
Actions first! Here you can explore our most recent activities:
And, our new project relates to continuing efforts with tropical forest restoration, governance and commitment, La Hondura Canyon reserve will receive a new support from Fondo Acción and their Tropical Forest Conservation Act (TFCA) initiative, and this will include cellebrating a Forest Festival in 2024, to involve more community. Keep tuned! We will keep you posted here and also within that Canyon website - here.
With gratitude,
Felipe Velasco
Director at Fundación Montecito
Links:
Dear donors and supporters,
We have recently created our 'Planting Trees to Harvest Birdlife' initiative, allocating efforts towards our Xieti Nature Reserve, one of the two nature sites for which this project is having your support at GlobalGiving. More details about that initiative can be found here.
Besides, we also created an 'Adopt a Plot / Adopt a Small Forest / Adopt a Tree' complementary effort, with which we offer to people and/or entities the chance to get involved in conservation and climate action, by supporting a progresive native forest plantation, next to lake Tota - it is called the Xieti network of friends, having a map and a monitoring sheet for those interested in being part of it by adopting trees, it can be found here.
To adopt a plot, a small forest or a tree for that purpose, you can just contact us to agree on details. Otherwise, you might wish to go directly to choose your adopting option and area, by following this link.
With gratitude,
Felipe Velasco
Fundación Montecito
Links:
Dear donors and supporters,
Our two nature reserves, Xieti at Lake Tota, and La Hondura Canyon at river Huertas canyon; are both in progress.
Xieti Nature Reserve has experienced a numer of environmental education interchanges with local schools (click for more), we have accomplished our "1.000 new native trees for 2022" campaign (see news here), a new private ally has decided its support by adopting a 'native tree area', green filter is working well (learn more), and a new "thinking corner" is being prepared in a lovely spot of our site, to enhance opportunities for reflection and project ideas forward.
In turn, La Hondura Canyon Nature Reserve has continued with community conservation activities (mainly trap cameras and biodiversity workshops and practices), Colombian oaks have been planted in nearly our 1.500 units goal, a new small edible forest was planted (learn more), and monitoring biodiversity has continued non stop with 20 camera traps within our reserve, also having some of them shared with our community for monthly perios of time. Its biodiversity is being organized in a new and comprehensive website, for this reserve, it will be reacheable here: clh.fundacionmontecito.org
Thank you all for being supportive of this climate action project, and we invite you to spread the word of it among your groups, family and friends, and to stand in solidarity for more progress to be shared soon.
Kind regards,
Felipe Velasco
Fundación Montecito
Links:
Dear donors and supporters,
We are happy to be sharing with you this news: Xieti Nature Reserve at Lake Tota, has been reviewed, accepted and registered as a new OECM private area in Colombia. OECMs (Other Effective Area-Based Conservation Measures) are “A geographically defined area other than a Protected Area, which is governed and managed in ways that achieve positive and sustained long-term outcomes for the insitu conservation of biodiversity, with associated ecosystem functions and services and where applicable, cultural, spiritual, socio–economic, and other locally relevant values” (CBD, 2018).
This represents a major outcome for our purposes with our Climate Action project you are supporting here at GlobalGiving, since it clearly introduces one of the two nature reserves we have behind the project as a true highlight in terms of private conservation to deserve being supported. Xieti Nature Reserve has become the first and only OECM private area so far not only within Lake Tota's basin, but in the whole region of Boyacá, the state or department in Colombia where this reserve is located. No matter it is certainly a small area (3.2 Ha) -not compared to the size of our 2nd reserve we are managing as part of this project in La Hondura Canyon with 290 Ha-, this outcome is not really about size but more in regards to commitment to conservation purposes, also as a pilot hopefully to be followed by many more in our region and elsewhere.
Worldwide, OECMs and all protected areas are gathered in one single platform to visibilize those private and public efforts towards conservation, it is called ProtectedPlanet*, and the link to Xieti Nature Reserve in it is reachable here: https://www.protectedplanet.net/555744969
*Protected Planet is the authoritative source of data on protected areas and other effective area-based conservation measures (OECMs). It exists due to the extensive efforts of governments and other stakeholders to map, monitor and report data on protected areas and OECMs. Through the Protected Planet website, users can explore the World Database on Protected Areas (WDPA), World Database on OECMs, Global Database on Protected Area Management Effectiveness (GD-PAME), and a wealth of associated information. (Source: PP website, here).A link within the Xieti Nature Reserve to highlight this outcome, is already visible here: https://xieti.abctota.org/reserva-natural/omec-xieti
Your support to our project is a fundamental motivation to continue and invite others to join these efforts to act against our climate crisis, with positive initiatives related to increasing conservation and enhancing human-nature harmony.
In gratitude,
Felipe Velasco
Fundación Montecito
Links:
Dear donors and supporters,
We are happy to announce that internships for this project are open! Overcoming that long pandemic pause, our next intern is coming from French Guyana in May this year, and will be with us for two months supporting our whole set of activities - monitoring wildlife, helping us with community workshops, giving us a hand on ecological restoration and much more.
Internships and volunteering are a superb way to create win-win interchanges and relationships. Besides the ordinary job, the cultural and academic interchange is greatly appreciated, and we try our best to make those experiences memorable and meaningful for all of our collaborators.
Since our NGO was founded (2010), we have been rewarded with the interest and collaboration from nearly a 100 people from more than 20 countries, counting all of our five continents. This help has had a value that goes far beyond of 'just work', and it represents a continuous motivation for our mission. Some of our volunteers and interns have become friends of frequent contact, to the extent of being nominated by us as Ambassadors or our nonprofit.
I take this opportunity to recognize the positive example from all of our volunteers and interns who have decided to come and stay in collaborating to us, shoulder to shoulder, to make things done. Their solidarity and will to help is, no-doubt, one of the best examples of what a GlobalGiving can be.
Looking forward to having more applicants in the near future, here is the application form we defined for this purpose: https://bit.ly/vola-fm
Warm regards,
Felipe Velasco
Fundación Montecito
Links:
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