Forests4Water Brazil: Community Climate Action

Dear donors,

 I hope that you are all staying well and, for those of you in the US, getting ready for Thanksgiving?

And may we just remind you that after Thanksgiving, comes Black Friday, Cyber Monday and then… Giving Tuesday!

And this year, it's going to be amazing because.....

GlobalGiving has $1,000,000 in matching funds. So please kick in a donation if you possibly can, and encourage your friends, relatives and work colleagues to join you!

Just post the project link on your social media, and be sure to tell them that, thanks to the matching funds, their donations will go even further.

So now for a quick update on the planting. It’s been raining steadily and, as you know, that´s great for planting.

We’ve finally finished planting on Bruno´s place, and we were delighted to discover that there are some areas on his property that are already in the process of regeneration. In these cases, all we need to do is enrichment planting with key species that will attract pollinators, speed up the process of forest growth and increase the rate of biodiversity. And it underlines the fact that forests really want to be forests, and that with the right care, and so long as they haven´t been paved over, they recover!

After finishing on Bruno's land, we started work on Luiz’ place, where we planted seedlings from our own forest nursery as well as others from one of the community forest nurseries. At the same time, some of our team worked on a neighboring property that is particularly steep and difficult of access. There´s no way that any of our vehicles can make it up there, so the seedlings have to be carried in beer crates. Happily, with cloud cover, if not actual heavy rain, it isn’t too hot, although it can be muddy. And it’s great exercise!

It’s rewarding work, but we can´t pretend it isn´t hard, and we are always delighted to have help from wherever it comes. We hire planting teams from the local community, and they are joined by volunteers who come to us from different parts of Brazil. These volunteers are usually biologists or scientists of some sort, and often they join us after enrolling in our environmental leaders course. And they love it! We frequently hear them say how excited they are to be out of the classroom and into the field, getting dirt under their fingernails.

We are so lucky to have them! And, in the meantime the nursery expansion is going really well, New seedling tables are in place, the seedling shed is complete, and we are building a barn.

Thankyou so much dear donors, for your support, have a great Thanksgiving and when Giving Tuesday rolls around, please don't forget Forests4Water!

With love and appreciation from 

Luiz and Alfredo 

PS Did we mention that one of the things we are urgently raising money for is a really sturdy vehicle? You can see how much time and sweat that would save! 

Good morning, dear donors, from the rainy rainforest!

 And while so many friends and colleagues are meeting in Glasgow and in hubs around the world to work on the pressing issues of climate change, we here at Iracambi are doing our part by planting trees!

And we're doing it with your support. Thank you! 

This letter comes with a couple of maps to show you areas in which we are a) monitoring and maintaining seedlings planted in 2020 and b) preparing the area, digging the holes and planting some of this year's crop of healthy seedlings.

These properties are located in the area known as Graminha da Montanha, a highly strategic area very close to the border of the Serra do Brigadeiro State Park. So we're not only restoring the forest to protect the water resources in this important watershed, but we're also extending habitat for biodiversity.

You'll often hear of projects where people claim to be planting thousands of trees at very low cost. And you may wonder why our trees cost more. We're currently planting at a cost of $3.55 per tree, and, as production and planting increase, we hope to make economies of scale. BUT. Here´s a difference. Our trees are planted, monitored and maintained. Which is a lot of work. And we now have a survival rate of 89%

As you've probably gathered if you've been following our adventures, planting in new areas can be challenging, particularly when they include steep mountain sides. Thick vegetation needs to be cleared with a strimmer, holes need to be dug, seedlings need to be tranported to the planting sites, and all this before the seedlings are planted and fertilized.  

Both areas where we are planting currently are delineated by yellow polygons (areas planted in 2020 and currently under maintenance) and white polygons showing the areas currently under restoration. These two areas comprise 6 hectares, 1.75 planted last year, and 4.25 under restoration right now where we've almost finished planting a total of 4,000 seedlings.

Most of the seedlings come from our forest nursery, but this year for the first time we're including some seedlings produced in on-farm nurseries - another initative that we set up in 2020 and which is being very successful in persuading landowners to understand the complex and exciting process of forest restoration, as well as bringing them an alternative income source. We have over fifty different tree  species, carefully selected in accordance with topography, soils and exposure to sun/shade.  

So, while we're sadly not attending COP in person, we´re not copping out! 

with love and appreciation from Luiz, Alfredo and the forestry team