AFRICA
Landscape-scale conservation and a pioneering plant-based agriculture program that enters the cellulosic century of renewable resources
“The period from 1840 to 1970 featured dramatic growth and innovation across multiple arenas — energy and transportation and medicine and agriculture and communication and the built environment. In the last two generations, progress has become increasingly monodimensional — all tech and nothing else.”
— Ross Douhat, citing Northeastern University
economist Robert Gordon, New York Times
The greatest message you can have to respond to the challenges of climate change, wildlife extinction and environmental degradation is innovation. There is knowledge and technology to do things differently.
Life on Earth depends on many finely balanced, interwoven cycles that come together to produce the environments we need to thrive, including interactions between landscapes and biodiversity. Our Africa programs build plant-based landscapes that protect forests, soil and wildlife habitats while fostering economic growth through investments in land that help restore the natural world.
We develop plant clusters that produce new agricultural and commercial opportunities that redefine the future of sustainable growth.
We build protections for wildlife into every project, including green corridors for large mammals to move between patches of forest, and we educate children about the immense value of wildlife to ecosystems and our planet’s future.
IPCC states that about half of all emissions of methane, one of the most potent greenhouse gases, come from cattle and rice fields. The impact of intensive agriculture has increased soil erosion and reduced amounts of organic material in the ground. While drought threatens to wipe out more than half of national herds of cattle in some African countries, opportunities for plant-based proteins and fibers have the potential to improve domestic food security and to contribute to the trillion-dollar export market for agricultural commodities.
In July 2019, African leaders launched a continental free-trade zone to unite 55 nations, create a powerful economic bloc, and bring a new era of development. The IMF has described the free-zone as an economic game changer.
Africa, with six of the world’s 10 fastest-growing economies, has seen a sharp rise in private business. It has the highest rate of entrepreneurship in the world, with 22 percent of working-age Africans launching new businesses compared with 13 percent of their counterparts in Asia and 19 percent in Latin America.
The consumers that agriculture will serve 20 years in the future are very different from the consumers it serves today. There is substantial opportunity to increase the revenue of plant-based markets, and significant growth potential for plant proteins and fibers in African countries.
Project provides solutions for:
Unsustainable use of threatened savanna woodland and species. Serious threats to biodiversity and habitat needed by wildlife to survive. Human-wildlife conflict, especially on land adjacent to the national parks.
Challenges with settlement of displaced people transforming the landscape through construction of new settlements and infrastructure, increasing demand for fuel wood and use of forest land for farming and other income-generating activities.
Logging and encroachment by communities living around protected areas due to limited alternative livelihoods.
Low agricultural production and productivity of both traditional food and cash crops as a result of low soil fertility and impact of deforestation, climate change and drought.
Project countries: Uganda, Mozambique, South Africa, with plans to expand into Southeast Asia
This 10-year plant-based project recreates rural landscapes for biological conservation and diversity, environmental regeneration and climate mitigation.
Forests around the world have lost as much as 80 percent of their trees as land is cleared for agriculture, mining, the building of roads and economic development. Project introduces an innovative tree domestication program to scale up underused local species of trees that are candidates for a new wave of crop domestication. There are ideas in the forest that need to be adopted into agriculture. How do forests sustain themselves without irrigation, without pesticides, without oil-based fertilizers, not even herbicides? They are self-sustaining systems. Forests do not need to be cleared for the expansion of agriculture to feed growing human populations, bringing problems that cascade into critical habitats and some of the most beautiful land on Earth. They are ecosystems that contain energy, mulching material and many commodities like foods, pharmaceuticals and oils that can take us far ahead of current models of agriculture.
Focuses on the key role of soil organic carbon in the fertility of soils and agroecosystems. Soils contain the largest pool of carbon interacting with the atmosphere. Increasing soil organic carbon enhances soil quality, improves agricultural resilience, and creates an effective carbon sink.
Moves from monoculture grains to polyculture, with growing methods for perennial grains, fruits, roots and vegetables on a large scale.
Plants grasses, bushes, trees that check evaporation, moderate heat and provide wind breaks that protect crops while creating corridors for wildlife to move between patches of forest; intersperses trees with cropland to protect soils, diversify production and provide habitats and food for wildlife.
By 2050 there will be 2 billion more people in the world than we have now, with most of the increase occurring in developing countries that are beginning to consume more beef, chicken, pork, fish, and dairy products. A pound of meat requires a tremendous amount of water because farmers use water-intensive crops like corn and soy to feed each animal. The world is projected to face a 40% freshwater deficit in just 12 years (WWAP, 2012). Nearly 30% of all our global freshwater consumption is used for livestock (directly, for pastures, and through crops to feed them), an inefficient food system that strains and depletes natural resources we depend upon for existence. Project introduces a low-technology strategy that works well in areas without electricity or running water, operates on reduced water supply, and uses propagators that are effective in moist and dry tropics. Diversification between drought-resistant plants, crops, trees and pasture also give a buffer to a farmer’s vulnerability.
Uses farm resources like feed by-products to improve income and enhance nutrient and carbon cycling processes.
Selects traits and breeds warm-season perennial grasses for soil fertility improvement.
Promotes gender equality and the important role of women and girls as key catalysts for change.
Addresses the critical problem of trees used for production of charcoal.
INDIA
The preservation of critical habitats, ecotourism and advanced plant-based programs with alternative incomes for owners of captive elephants
“Captive elephants are hideously treated. Used since ancient times for work and war, this is how we repay them. Without raising public awareness, and serious commercial and political engagement now, the Asian elephant is doomed, in our lifetime, and by our hands.”
— Duncan McNair
The Asian elephant has been classified as endangered by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF). Its population has declined by 50 percent over the past 75 years.
Elephants play an important role in ecosystems. They make pathways in dense forested habitat that allow passage for other animals. They disperse seed 30 times farther than savanna birds take seeds, and they play a significant role in maintaining the genetic diversity of trees on the savanna. They are one of the most treasured animals on our planet, but in secret training camps in Kerala, they haven’t a friend in the world. Nandan (photo above) is held with 56 other elephants at the secretive Guruvayur Temple, a camp that trains elephants for festivals and sales to temples. He has been chained in that spot, unable to stretch or lie down and never released, for even an hour, for 25 years.
With our collaborating partners, we develop advanced plant-based programs with alternative incomes for owners of captive elephants and their mahouts. We’re building wildlife refuges that attract humane ecotourism and we are bringing programs to schools and training centers to educate the next generation of children on the importance of elephants in preserving the healthy forests that protect our planet, helping children to become wildlife protectors.
GET INVOLVED
We can take responsibility for the tragedy of captive elephants. International effort is needed to secure better futures for these magnificent creatures.
Join the fight for the humane treatment of elephants and to urge their release. Your support today will help build desperately needed wildlife refuges and humane ecotourism, letting captive elephants take the first steps towards life beyond cruel training camps.
Yes, I’ll join this fight for captive elephants
with a donation today.
