By Robin Van Loon | Executive Director
Hello Friends of Camino Verde,
We have so many reasons to be grateful – even after, especially after, this whirlwind of a year we have had. From the global pandemic to widespread political tension in Peru, the US, and elsewhere. From the California wildfires to the Amazon burning again, almost as strongly as it famously did last year. Even after so much loss, new life emerges from the compost. Decay transforms into growth, if we just give it a little encouragement and then step out of the way.
As we approach the end of the year, we are reflecting with deep gratitude on all the support we have received in such unprecedented times. You, our donors have kept the work of Camino Verde consistent, and at such a critical time. Although things have been slower than normal, with Peru experiencing a drastically strict shutdown for much of the year, we have continued to plant and deliver trees to our community partners. We have continued to develop regenerative, transparent Amazonian supply chains for endangered species like rosewood. And as a team we have reflected on our priorities, decided to grow more of our own food, sought to use less fossil fuel and to listen to each other more.
It is always with humility and gratitude that we turn to our loyal network scattered around the globe. Now once more, we ask you to consider the possibility of including Camino Verde in your holiday giving – whether in memory of a loved one, as a gift for a friend, or simply because you want to deepen your impact toward helping keep Earth’s ecosystems vital and whole.
Camino Verde is honored to be a vehicle for the wishes and intentions of so many people who care about life. We are honored to turn prayers and desires for a more biologically vibrant future into action. We are honored to create meaningful livelihood for a team of over 20 people on the ground in Peru, not to mention a hundred farmers in our network. We are thankful for you, thankful that there are so many like you who want to help. We’re grateful that you consider making a donation this season, no matter how large or small.
And there’s an exciting chance to make your donation count more, coming on Tuesday. Our longtime partner GlobalGiving will be offering an unprecedented million dollars in matching funds this Giving Tuesday. Give through GG here this Tuesday to make your donation count extra. We’ll send a friendly reminder on Monday.
What are your donations going to support?
In addition to tree planting itself, CV is developing a groundbreaking new technology to document the trees we plant, transparently, tree by tree. As one of the winners selected for Ashoka’s Act for Biodiversity Challenge, we have received mentoring support and a cash prize that have helped us catapult into action, setting up an app and a sophisticated backend database to make the documenting of trees easy, efficient, and stunningly traceable. Our application, Real Trees will help provide transparency for donors and help farmers get paid for planting trees. Find out more in the coming missives.
Meanwhile, this year we’re getting 2 more native communities involved in our rosewood supply chain, and reaching out to reforestation partners around the globe (Uganda and Tanzania to begin with) to implement the Real Trees technology in the field to register hundreds of thousands of, well, real trees. And your donation is being complemented by an increased focus on diversified revenue streams: we’re selling our essential oils, now more than ever, in the United States and Europe. Here in Peru we continue to locally sell bananas and other farm products every week. 2021 looks bright, but we can’t do it without you.
From time to time we ask one of our team members to share a bit about the work they do at Camino Verde. This offers a glimpse into the day to day of our reforestation crew and also gives the team a chance to reflect on the impact of the work they do. This time we’ve asked Percy to write about his experience as farm and nursery coordinator at CV La Joya in Tambopata, Peru. The writing has been translated from Spanish – and we have been careful not to edit his words too much.
ENHANCING THE SOILS OF ‘THE JEWEL’
It’s curious because it seems like a month ago that we started. But as time passes and I look around me and see the changes, I realize that it hasn’t been months but years. Now this has become a place where everything grows happily, such a special place to think, reflect and receive the energy of peace, tranquility, happiness, without a doubt the best of life, all that and much more, simply for free. It’s a gift from the plants we sow, first Manuel, then Elvis, and me of course, Percy. Today, on a daily walk through the plots of CV La Joya (from the district’s name, “the jewel”) one can find timber, fruit, medicinal species that generate a cool environment, humidity and shade. We constantly see rodents, rabbits, and from time to time monkeys, white-lipped peccaries or capybara. They visit us as lovers of the fruits of shimbillo (Inga sp.), granadilla (Passiflora sp., similar to passion fruit but less tart and tangy), cacao, jackfruit, cashew and many others.
I got involved in this organization four years ago. We started with the nursery installation, we built germination beds, stretched a canopy of shadecloth for the baby seedlings, erected a water tower. We also opened space in the undergrowth for plants that prefer to live under shade – they are the skiophilous species. I remember that the first seed we sowed in the La Joya Nursery was the Enterolobium that we collected from one of the large trees that we have here on the property. We installed it in root trainer pots and after two days the seed had already germinated. We were very happy at that time, Manuel and I, and after a year we had more than a hundred species ready for planting out in the field. The seedlings had different destinations, some sent to recover soils degraded by mining, others to rehabilitate soils degraded by pasture, and some stayed here in La Joya to rehabilitate the spaces invaded by the brachari grass (Brachiaria sp.) – and turn these lands back into forests.
Studying and working at the same time has not been impossible thanks to the support of Camino Verde. Establishing compatible working hours, I was able to study and finish the degree of forest sciences at the National Amazonian University of Madre de Dios. Today the objective is to recover the fertility of the soils, making plantations with species that add organic matter, nitrogen and other nutrients. In this way we contribute to the conservation of the environment, and we protect natural resources.
On the other hand we know that pollination is very important since almost 80% of the plants require pollination services so that they can produce fruits and seeds. In La Joya we also have two boxes of native Meliponas bees; these two will soon multiply and we will have four boxes.
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Thanks to Percy for this glimpse into life at La Joya, Camino Verde's largest nursery and 3rd largest agroforestry site. We are so grateful for Percy’s contribution to the work we do. The knowledge and insight of team members like Percy make it all possible.
And thanks to you for your continued belief and support, even through the challenges of a time that is utterly unique in our collective memory. We are honored to do the work we do.
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In gratitude,
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