Tropical partnerships

One of the reasons for creating TROFACO, was the fact that lion’s share of the benefits of climate compensation schemes were ending up in the hands of consultants and administrators. We believe tropical communities, who pollute the least, but are most heavily affected by climate change, should be the main beneficiaries of any climate change mitigation efforts. Ensuring benefits for these communities can be difficult, but it is hard-wired into the DNA of TROFACO. 

All of our work is based on partnerships with strong, passionate, and trustworthy organisations. These organisations help us identify communities with land to plant trees, organise the plantings, and provide us with pictures and updates from the planting sites. We spend a lot of our time identifying and carefully vetting each of these organisations in order to make sure they are capable and reliable. Once we have established a working relationship, we trust them with daily operations in their respective areas. As they have many years of experience organising projects and strong ties to community leaders, they are by far the best suited to handle operations. Most importantly, we trust them to make sure all of the money goes to the right people. 

Benefits for communities

Creating jobs
With the help of our partners, we can start doing the real work; tree-planting projects. Our partners identify a robust, well-functioning community with room to plant trees. Once we have met the community and settled on a place to plant trees, we start getting seedlings ready. For this, we use local nurseries in order to create jobs for people in the area. During the next rainy season, plant the trees using the help of community members. After they are planted, they need to be cared for, weeded out, and watered. Both the planting and tending is of course financed by us, giving work to the local people.

Trees; a steady source of income
As the trees grow, they will provide an additional source of income. Many of the trees we plant are fruit trees, such as mango or jackfruit, which provide food that would otherwise be bought at the market. In most cases, the local communities are even able to sell the fruits, as the trees produce a lot. Additionally, as these communities know the local plants so well, they will often plant trees that can be used for medicine, saving them money and trips to the local markets.

Timber
Once the trees have grown for twenty years, the community has total autonomy over the trees. Most often they will sell some of the trees for timber. These trees can be immensely valuable, with one tree being worth upwards of 10.000 dollars. This timber will be used for houses and furniture, providing semi-permanent CO2 capture. Of course, these trees will be replanted afterwards. For a community in a rural, tropical village, these trees are a life-changing investment for future generations.