Local people are the ones who best understand their own needs. That’s why they select the tree species they want to plant. Among the options: shrubs in living fences around fields to prevent animals from destroying the harvest, fast-growing trees to provide firewood, fruit trees to improve their sources of food and income, increasingly rare trees once used in traditional medicine, as well as roadside trees and residential trees to offer shade or simply beautify the area.
Trees are then planted in the areas that make the most sense and where they’ll be well taken care of. Villagers tend to the trees so they’re not eaten by the first goat that passes (which is crucial in countries with roaming herds), in addition to protecting the trees, watering them, and replacing them when necessary.
The villagers are then trained to harvest and market the forest products, accompanied in the beginning by experienced staff. Later, the newly planted trees generate income for them. That’s not all, though. They’re also an important source of healthy food for families and a building block of strong communities through their promotion of producer associations (of women in particular).
The Forest&Life tree is at the root of a sustainable and enduring rural economy.
There’s no better way to change the minds and habits of adults than through their children. Forest&Life teams up with grade schools in most countries where it has projects.
Kinomé seeks to create relationships between these schools internationally, forming a veritable network of schools throughout the world. In 2010, Kinomé cofounded the Schools and Forests in Solidarity program in the Landes department in France. 40 classes, or close to 1000 students, in 5th grade have already participated in the program and 60 additional classes are going to join the program at the start of the next school year! Each tree planted in France is matched by the planting of 2 trees in one of the tropical countries where Forest&Life works, hence the slogan “one tree for me, 2 trees for you, 3 trees for the planet.”
Don’t hesitate to contact us to find out more about the Schools and Forests in Solidarity program.
To effectively combat deforestation, we must create new forests while simultaneously protecting existing ones. Neither works without the other! The principle is simple: the best way to protect a forest is to plant trees that are useful to local people near their villages so they are not drawn to illicitly chop them down in nearby forests. For example, planting a eucalyptus grove at the edge of a village often deters people from felling rare, old-growth trees in the forest for firewood. In keeping with this strategy, we protect the tree seeds that germinate naturally in the forest so that they can grow undistributed. To accomplish this, all we have to do is build an enclosure (either natural or man-made) around the seed or around a strip of land we're bringing back to life. This is the Assisted Natural Regeneration (ANR) technique, used alongside other forest protection methods, and widely deployed in Forest&Life planting projects.
Adults and children men and women are all trained by Forest&Life teams on the ground. The teams also raise awareness, assist local residents with the project at hand, and conduct extensive follow-up and project tracking.
These steps are key to protect success, building a sense of ownership among the population, and its independently flourishing. Ultimately, the goal is for residents to independently make project activities an integral part of their overall lifestyles, reproducing its positive results in the future instead of being simply a one-off benefit.
This is the key to Forest&Life teams, enabling them to create lasting impact through their up-close understanding of the realities, constraints, but also unforeseen assets of the local environment like ancestral knowledge, people's capacity to adapt, and traditions of solidarity and mutual assistance.
