The failure of the bill affects REDD not only in Panama, but throughout the world. Primarily, it hamstrings any meaningful encapsulating agreement coming out of Cancun in December, and probably even South Africa in 2011. More and more it looks like the best thing that can come out of Cancun for REDD is a "REDD+ Readiness" package that the new REDD+ Partnership can build off of. More on that Partnership later...

Most importantly for REDD, it doesn't look like we will have a significant market for any credits generated in the next 5-6 years; not a great signal to the private sector and investors. Not all is lost and I doubt that there would have been significant amounts of credits available in 5-6 years anyway, but it would have triggered significant investment into making REDD "operationalized" and setting standards.

Now, what we have is the Norwegians single handily financing the majority of the REDD work in the world and providing significant guaranteed monies into the near-to-mid term for actual reductions. I doubt that government funds will be able to finance all of the REDD readiness work, or purchase the all of the credits generated from the reductions. 

There is a minimum of hope that the California cap and trade will survive. Its market, however will be a fraction of what is needed and can only probably support a couple of provincial projects out of Mexico and Indonesia.

Getting back to the REDD+ Partnership, it is off to a rough start because the co-chairs are not coordinating very well (Japan and PNG). However, there is hope that a core group can move the agenda forward and develop some standards for MRV (a database to track actions and financing), bring the three large "other" REDD institutions together into a secretariat (FCPF, FIP, and UNREDD), and develop some south-south exchanges.

Once PNG stops being an obstacle to it moving forward, I expect it to make significant progress. I think it also functions to put pressure on the UNFCCC process to make progress or risk more and more of the outside "partnerships" being organized to make progress. The next six months will be key to see if the REDD+ Partnership can find its legs and actually make some progress. Otherwise it will become just another forum to argue about process like the UNFCCC. 

At Planting Empowerment we will continue to follow the progress (or lack thereof) of the various REDD initiatives and other country level politics that affect the forestry sector. We are heartened that so much focus is on the deforestation problem and significantly more resources are flowing into the sector.

We believe this new focus will ultimately should yield significant quality of life benefits for those living in the forests, but also increase the ease of investing and potential profits for investors.

For mor information on why the bill failed, check out this post from Grist.

Just a quick note to let you know that a new video featuring Planting Empowerment will premiere tonight in NYC. The video was shot and produced by the Green Living Project, as part of their "Global Sustainability: Central America to Maine" series about sustainable business.

Hope to see you there!

Planting Empowerment in 2015 will be a self sustaining, fast-growing business with approximately 1000 hectares under cultivation, and approaching $6,000,000 of investment raised for the plantations. The business will restructure to become either an L3C or a B-corporation.

An L3C is a new type of corporation whose principal activity is social or environmental improvement, is limited-profitability, and is more "tax-attractive" to institutional investors such as endowments and trusts. With an eye on attaining scale, we are considering this option in order to tap into the social/environmental carve-outs of some of these investors.

B-corporations are businesses certified as meeting standards of environmental stewardship, corporate governance, and employee rights, among many others. We feel this kind of corporation makes sense if there is stronger demand for PE's products from the smaller retail market. Becoming a B-corp would place Planting Empowerment into a group of forward thinking businesses that share a "triple bottom line" philosophy.

The financial vehicle to carry the business forward is still under construction, but there are two possible scenarios of how to reach sustainability:

1. Non-profit ownership of for-profit. Between 2009-2010, Planting Empowerment went through some growing pains. Namely, facing a lack of operating capital, PE decides to go under the wing of its non-profit arm. The non-profit "mother" buys Planting Empowerment in order to secure venture financing for the for profit, and in 2011 is successful in raising $200,000 in operating capital. With the knowledge that the for profit arm would eventually leave the nest, we focus the financing on building a sustainable, scalable operation.

2. Planting Empowerment remains an independent for-profit. In this scenario, PE either scales organically through its consulting activities and sale of its products, or attains venture funding from an angel investor or venture capitalist. We currently see this option as more unlikely, given the long term nature of growing trees, and lack of an exit event for funders.

In either scenario, Planting Empowerment in 2015 is a thriving, self-financed operation.

With our roots in development, Washington DC seems the city of choice from which to run the business. Depending on the type of corporation pursued, the business may be incorporated in a more tax-friendly state, but the main office will remain in our nation's capitol. The office will be staffed by two of Planting Empowerment's founders, along with three fulltime employees. The US entity will issue future offerings, and own the Panamanian operations arm responsible for the planting and maintenance of the plantations. A full time Operations Director will live and work in Panama.

In our next post, we will discuss the specific programs that Planting Empowerment creates to promote sustainable development through forestry.

• Be a national system (potentially nested with a definite end for projects);
• Ensure the majority of the benefits reach those living in the forests;
• Not count enhanced forest carbon sequestration that comes from plantations (monoculture Teak, Oil Palm).

Why a national system? Independent projects are great, but they will just push the deforestation around the country - leakage, in other words. If these projects are to be included, it should be within a "nested" approach. This means that projects have a set amount of time (between 5-7 years) to merge their project into the national system, or "nest" it.

It still isn't clear who owns the carbon in the trees in Panama, and that will hopefully be determined in the coming years. To be effective, REDD projects will need to foment other income generating activities to replace the income gained from traditional practices. If the government and/or project promoters capture more than 30% of the cash generated from REDD, there won't be sufficient incentive at the local level to stop deforestation.

Now that REDD is REDD+, (the "+" means the countries/projects can get credit for carbon enhancement), we need to make sure that it is not used to support unsustainable forestry practices such as monoculture plantations. There is also the problem of "additionality" because the majority of the plantations are cultivated for the timber, not carbon capture. Sustainable environmental and social practices should be rewarded, not those that eventually leave land worse off and people not participating in an economically positive manner.

Panama just signed onto the Norwegian/French REDD partnership. This is good for Panama because it will help the country move forward in developing the national level systems and laws necessary to financing and knowledge exchange opportunities. It has the opportunity now with the UNREDD funds already approved to move forward and once again be at the forefront of national level REDD.

Fellow co-founder Andrew Wulf and I visited a Guarani indigenous village outside of Tena while on vacation/work. While there were numerous similarities between Panama and Ecuador in relation to conservation, economic opportunities, problems with land, and resource management, there were also many differences.

I arranged to stay with the brother of the President of the regional Guarani organization. He lives in his own little "compound" consisting of a couple of houses where his various children now live with their children. In total, about 15 people lived in the compound (10 under the age of 13). Along the river they had cleared about three hectares (7.5 acres) to plant corn (mostly for animals), papaya, cacao, yucca, plantains, bananas, and other fruiting trees indigenous to the area.

He probably controlled (with title) at least 250 hectares of prime jungle and supplemented his family's diet with wild game (we ate peccary and monkey) and fishing. As with many of the indigenous Panamanians I know, he may have been "cash poor", but no one was going hungry and there seemed to be a strong social safety net within the family.

This gentlemen's land was next to the oil production facilities operated by the Ecuadorian government. He informed us and showed us a map of where one of the oil companies wants to drill on his land, but he won't let them. Ecuador is similar to Panama in the sense that under ground minerals belong to the general public (i.e. government) and not the individual landowner. In this case, even though he doesn't own the oil rights (sold in concession by the government), he has to give permission to the company to access his land to exploit.

We discussed the potential oil drilling with his son (23-year old w/ a tourism background). Interestingly, not once did the son mention potentially becoming very wealthy in a monetary sense from drilling royalties. To him and his father, the oil drilling would only bring them problems by poisoning the virgin forest surrounding them. They had given the same response to the loggers, too. For being in the middle of nowhere, I would've thought we were a rarity for them - a couple of gringos visiting. But it turns out that we were only one of many small groups of tourists/students that had passed through in the last couple months. Having studied tourism the son was very focused on developing tourism in the region as a way to bring in needed cash.

I didn't delve into REDD with them, but understood their stance on conservation and thought about how it could benefit them economically. For them, REDD might work by providing supplementary income and capital to expand a small tourism business. It could easily work within a national system that would pay the larger indigenous organization 10-20% to support basic local services (schooling and health) and meet additionality questions (oil located on his land and near colonizers). The tourism component - which I see in this case providing a significant portion of their potential income - could be done in Panama. However, it would be much trickier and probably need to focus on birding because the Panamanian jungle doesn't have the same allure as the Amazon jungle. 

Although Ecuador didn't sign the Copenhagen Accord, it is still very much involved in REDD. It is probably more advanced than Panama because the government is pushing it along for political reasons (trying to become a country of UNREDD and Yasuni-ITT project). However, Ecuador has the moral challenge of having a ridiculous amount of oil left under their forests. Their choice is whether to exploit it or bet on REDD, conservation, and eco-tourism.

We'll be watching closely.

Small Fire in Plantation

In April we experienced a small fire in one of our plantations in Nuevo Paraiso. A local partner from whom we lease land was clearing an adjacent parcel to plant crops when the fire made its way past the fire break onto our plantation. Thanks to the vigilance and quick actions of worker Jose Rodriguez damage was kept to a minimum. An investigation is currently being conducted to assess total loss and to find ways to prevent another such incident. Sponsors can rest assured that the fire will not affect the value of their holdings, and PE assumes ownership of total losses associated with the incident.

UNDP Project

Last Fall we helped our local partners in Arimae obtain funding from the UNDP-GEF Small Grants Programme to conduct an economically and environmentally beneficial forestry project. We have continued to facilitate the project by providing technical assistance. The community has made significant progress since last year and will plant some of the products from the nursery they built as part of the project next month. In the future the nursery will be used to plant native species saplings which will be sold to Planting Empowerment for use in our own plantations. We will continue to provide our local community partners with assistance and economic opportunities whenever possible.

I was in Bonn last week for the first of two weeks of post-Copenhagen climate change negotiations. As I wrote in a blog post for the Environmental Defense Fund, indigenous rights language in the negotiating text - specifically the REDD+ section - is significant.

I wrote in that post:

Most promising in this is that the two-year-old brackets around the text – text is [bracketed] when it is controversial and does not have unanimous support from countries – have been removed.  This is a big victory for indigenous leaders, as it indicates strong support for indigenous peoples' rights.

For example, this excerpt was bracketed:

(c) Respect for the knowledge and rights of indigenous peoples and members of local communities, by taking into account relevant international obligations, national circumstances and laws, and noting that the General Assembly has adopted the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples;

(d) Full and effective participation of relevant stakeholders, including, in particular, indigenous peoples and local communities in actions referred to in paragraphs 3 and 5 below;

Is the text perfect? No. There are still sections where indigenous leaders want better language about rights and safeguards. The major issue in Bonn was whether the brackets around the remaining social safeguards text would be removed, i.e. be accepted by country negotiators. The latest draft released did not remove the brackets, so this issue will be debated in future negotiations.

As I noted before, the international language is only good as its implementation on the ground, which is often poor. In Panama for example, the community of Arimae (where Planting Empowerment located some of its plantations) still doesn't have secure title to all of its lands. Nor is there consensus on who owns the carbon in the forest, which has been conserved at great expense by the indigenous peoples.

At a global level the negotiating text for REDD is looking much better for indigenous peoples. However, there is still work to be done to strengthen the implementation language in the text, and actually see that translate to positive action on the ground. Things are moving in a good direction in Panama, but the country needs to move quicker to protect its remaining forest and increase benefits to the local peoples.

View the entire document

• To slow deforestation, forest dwellers need an incentive not to deforest
• Land tenure is paramount in addressing deforestation
• Rainforest dwellers can earn more from their undervalued parcels of land through sustainable forestry
• Forestry projects would be funded by environmentally and socially-minded investors

Since Planting Empowerment formed in late 2006, we have signed four land-lease partnerships with local Panamanians, planted 22,000 trees over 50 acres, and raised $140,000 from over 100 sponsors to finance these operations. We're pretty happy with the progress thus far, and have received positive feedback from our sponsors, local partners, and government agencies. However, there are still thousands of acres of deforested land available - owned by thousands of rainforest dwellers who want better lives.

As Planting Empowerment enters a growth phase, we are dealing with the growing pains of funding and organizational structure, among others. Sometimes we get so wrapped up in details that we lose sight of the big picture, er, don't see the forest for the trees.

So, in the next few posts we will describe our vision for the upcoming five years. Think of them as snapshots of different areas of the business - operations, environmental and social benefits, business structure, number of trees planted, capital raised, and so on.

Stay tuned.

Securities regulations require that public offerings be registered with the SEC - a costly and time consuming process. Thus, Planting Empowerment does not markets investments, but Sponsorships with the expectation of periodic repayments.

From a messaging perspective this gets confusing. Chances are you already understand something about responsible investments, and it is clearer to describe our products as such. However, we are obligated to avoid "investment" language in explaining our products, and that tends to cloud the message.

For example, in comparing website traffic over the last three months with the previous three months, we saw a significant decline in information requests and transactions. We attribute this to lack of clarity about our offerings.

In short, the characteristics of our offerings have not changed:

• You still support sustainable forestry projects in Panama
• You still help to reforest degraded land, create jobs, and promote sustainable development
• We project a "full repayment, plus a bonus"
• We update you on the social and environmental impacts you are creating

You should view sponsorship as a long term comittment. While we are investigating short term revenue-generating activities from the plantations, growing and harvesting trees takes time, and there is a chance that you will not receive repayments. However, through the support of our 100+ customers, 22,000 trees are in the ground, and locals are benefiting from lease payments and increased employment.

Selling securities is expensive. For now this is a cost that Planting Empowerment, as a small organization, can not afford. We are in the process of raising capital to fully register our sponsorships with the SEC, at which point they will become investments. When these steps are completed the investments may be sold through brokerages or as part of a mutual fund - in addition to being available through our website.

The SEC takes measures to ensure that individual investors are protected, and we are fully compliant with their regulations.

Sponsoring sustainable forestry projects is a smart way to look after your own financial interests while doing something good for the planet. The plantation inventory of our Adelante project is 70% sold. If you would like to get involved, please visit our Sponsor page.

Although the author gets some facts incorrect - claiming, for example the "+" in REDD+ represents what are more widely known as co-benefits rather than enhanced forest carbon stocks as noted in the LCA text (i.e. sequestering carbon, or afforestation) - he does do a service in pointing out potential problems with REDD.

The gist of the author's argument is that REDD will centralize decision-making over forest resources within government and prevent community managment. Panama is a good example of the decentralization process because it has been slowly recognizing indigenous peoples' rights over their land.

There is still much to be done and it is unclear how the Panamanian government will proceed with REDD. Nonetheless, we would argue that now there are actually more indigenous leaders in Panama with an understanding of REDD than counterparts at the ministry of environment (ANAM). Panama actually had its UN-REDD proposal delayed because it lacked a required signature from the IP (Indigenous Peoples) representative and concerns expressed to United Nations REDD staff.

At the international level (FIP, FCPF, UNREDD) there is an understanding that indigenous peoples and communities will need to "own" REDD if it is to work. Without their buy in and receipt of the majority of the benefits, there won't be a reduction in deforestation and payments will not flow to anyone - government included. Policy makers at the national level should use community forestry management programs in Nepal and Mexico as examples when designing their REDD programs.

Planting Empowerment advocates more community management of forests. The successful examples of community management in Mexico were supported for 10+ years by outside technical assistance and capital. This enabled skills development at the local level and development of institutions and businesses. We are training local stakeholders to effectively manage their resources in order to profit sustainably and achieve conservation and carbon goals. 

Spanish:

I recently had the privilege of hearing Elinor Ostrom, the 2009 Nobel Laureate in Economics. She won the Nobel for her analysis of "the commons" and communal decision making.

Her work is pertinent to Planting Empowerment because she has studied community forestry and conservation. Along with various colleagues, she has found that conservation actually increases when control of forests are decentralized. This has been proven through various community forestry programs in Nepal and Mexico that increased conservation by enabling more local control of forests.

Our partnering community Arimae is indigenous, and manages its land communally. Although their land title is now being processed, they have been without legal possession for too long because the Panamanian government didn't recognize collective land rights. This lack of recognition has emboldened loggers and cattle ranchers to encroach on Arimae's land.

Arimae's reserve is roughly 25,000 acres. The community's land management plan sets aside a significant amount of rainforest (about 10,000 acres) for conservation. The rest of the land is distributed to community members. Each receives a roughly 25 acre plot for personal activities such as homesteading, agriculture, and tree planting. Additionally, large tracts of converted land are reserved for projects like Planting Empowerment's mixed species tree plantations, or other larger projects.

Our lease payments and future profit sharing are proving that Arimae can generate significant returns from already cultivated land. This then enables them to invest in conserving the remainder of their rainforest preserve and in other revenue generating activites.

Central government control over forests diminishes the sense of ownership for local forest dwellers. This in turn reduces their incentive to sustainably manage those resources. When the Panamanian government opened up the Darien province for settling, it didn't have the means to control unsustainable colonization. This Google Earth shot tells the whole story. You can see Arimae's forest reserve surrounded by deforested cattle pasture and cropland. Arimae has been battling for its land title for decades. Now finally, the Panamanian government appears committed to granting Arimae full control over its land and resources.

Arimae demonstrates the accuracy of Dr. Ostrom's work on communal decision making - Arimae makes more sustainable choices about land management and resource allocation than the central government. The Panamanian government is waking up to this fact, but too bad the lesson has been so environmentally costly.

Another of the offset projects profiled is managed by SilvaTree, based in Panama. The report claims that SilvaTree is inconsistent in its claims that its pawlonia tree plantations are certified by the Voluntary Carbon Standard (VCS). SilvaTree states that they are taking legal action against CS Monitor for defamation and misrepresentation.

I thought each of the reports was interesting, and recommend reading them. However, we are worried that the SilvaTree exposé will give all forestry projects a bad name. So, we'd like to explain a bit more about how Planting Empowerment operates.

Planting Empowerment doesn't guarantee a financial return. The only guaranteed return I know of is the 0.5% interest on my savings account, insured by the FDIC. And the guarantee is only that I won't lose my principal. Too many timber plantations lure investors by guaranteeing high returns only to disappoint them at year five when promised dividends don't appear. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

We sell a hectare of mixed native species (with 30% teak) for $15,000. We plant 1100 trees per hectare, pay higher prices for land because of our lease model, and share our cut of profits with the landowners/local communities. SilvaTree charges $35,000/hectare and guarantees a higher return while only planting 660 trees. More trees planted doesn't necessarily mean more wood production, but it does provide a larger pool from which to cull and maximize timber quality. Also, PE plantations include at least seven different types of trees. This diversity lowers the risk of blight in our plantations, and reduces exposure to price fluctuations in timber markets.

On purchasing carbon offsets: the forestry carbon market is still young and you should educate yourself about forestry carbon credits at the Forest Carbon Portal website before making any purchases. They put out a good report on the market and you should compare it to SilvaTree's and other businesses' claims about their carbon credits. Planting Empowerment has sold carbon credits, but only in personal deals where both parties understood the transaction and where those credits came from. Planting Empowerment will refrain from selling carbon credits to the general public until the market solidifies and we certify the plantations.

A note about REDD (Reducing Emissions from Degradation/Deforestation) projects in Panama. Investing in any REDD scheme that purports to generate carbon credits is like playing craps. The Panamanian government has yet to decide who actually owns the carbon in the trees. Be prepared to lose all your investment when the government/local landowners get the majority of the revenue from carbon offset sales.

We encourage the ideas that new plantation companies are exploring and their potential to slow deforestation and improve economic opportunities. However, we are skeptical of "guaranteed" returns, monocultures, and promises of selling carbon credits. Most importantly, forestry projects designed to benefit the environment should also benefit locals who depend so much on their natural resources. Our position is that projects that displace or alienate the local population are not sustainable in the long run.

What is the true value of the rainforest?

Worldwide, regrowth of secondary forest is outpacing deforestation. In Panama for instance, forest cover was lost at 1.3% in 1990, but regeneration of degraded land increased by 4%. The renewed forest cover could substantially offset the carbon deficit from deforestation, but biologists argue that secondary forests don't compare to primary forests in terms of the amount of wildlife they contain. They suggest that secondary forest could serve as corridors between areas of primary jungle, but they should not be seen as a replacement. 

Does focusing too much on rainforest conservation prevent smallholders from making a living?

In the NY Times piece, Joe Wright, a senior scientist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute suggests that trying to conserve rainforest too tightly prevents smallholders from making a living from it. Kuna tribesman Toniel Edman - interviewed for the CNN article - states that it is easy to get loans for cattle breeding, but that's about it. Some of the funding for rainforest conservation could go towards increasing access to financing for forestry and sustainable agriculture. Planting Empowerment is currently managing a small UNDP-GEF funded project with its partner community of Arimae. Part of the project includes intercropping cash crops between rows of planted trees. The goal is to subsidize the long term care of the trees with the earnings from these crops. We think this could be very effective not only in regenerating degraded land, but also in preventing deforestation of primary rainforest.

Population growth and shifts?

As we explored in the previous post, deforestation is increasingly driven by consumer demand. As more people move into cities and a gain better quality of life, businesses cater to their needs. People migrating into the city also leave behind their agricultural plots and cattle pasture. So, one would think that these businesses' need for land could be satisfied by the plots their now-consumers have left behind in the countryside. What prevents industry from utilizing this already converted land? To make their products cost effective, industry requires large swaths of contiguous land. Separating production into disjointed plots doesn't make economic sense. Also, until primary forest is valuated for more than its conversion value, it is the cheapest way for industry to gain land. Rainforest needs to be worth more standing than felled, or this will continue.

Although industry is now the main driver of deforestation, there is still the need to work with small landowners. Maximizing the return from their land and diversifying the income sources from it is very important. The problem we're seeing now is that smallholders are selling their land to industrial Teak enterprises because of reduced yields from subsistence agriculture/cattle and the need for short term income. The windfall incentivizes the smallholder to encroach and clear primary forest in the indigenous reservation. Solutions such as monthly payments and profit sharing of timber sales to small landowners provide the income they need while keeping them on their land.

Each country is different and has its own unique situation, so we only speak from Panama's perspective. The economic potential of secondary forests to smallholders and indigenous communities is constantly growing. Our work creates income streams from these secondary forests through tree planting and agroforestry. You can be part of this by owning trees planted on our partners' deforested land.

Significant potential to make use of forest thinnings

Washington DC, March 9, 2010—A group of MBA students from the MIT Sloan School of Business traveled to Panama to look at the revenue potential of forest thinnings from Planting Empowerment's (PE) tree plantations. The team spent a week analyzing different uses for the smaller trees before recommending biochar as the most promising option.

A sustainably managed tree plantation can take ten years to produce commercially viable timber. Part of the maintenance of plantations is periodic culling of smaller trees, allowing healthier ones more space to grow. Traditionally these thinnings have little or no commercial value, and are left to rot on the forest floor or serve as firewood. As part of the MIT Sloan Entrepreneurs in International Development Club (SEID) students Lily Russell, Justin Butler, and Adam Rein studied commercial uses for these thinnings with the goal of producing earlier returns for Planting Empowerment's investors. They decided that biochar has the most potential because of its multiple uses and low initial production costs.

"When looking at alternative uses for PE’s wood fiber, we considered industrial fuel consumers (paper, pellets), furniture, a biomass power plant and a few other alternatives. However, we ultimately decided that producing biochar and fertilizer (using the biochar as an additive) were the best fit for: PE’s model, market opportunities and technical feasibility" said Lily Russell, one of the students leading the study. She added "It was fascinating to spend time with the PE team and community members involved in their projects; it gave us tremendous perspective into the social and environmental impact of the PE business model as well as the need for such initiatives. Truly impressive."

Biochar is charcoal that can be used for cooking fuel, heat source, carbon capture, or fertilizer additive. Indigenous tribes of the Amazon basin used biochar - known as terra preta (black earth) - as a soil additive. Biochar can improve soil quality by increasing moisture and nutrient retention rates. Most interesting for Planting Empowerment is its ability to increase the effectiveness of organic fertilizer. Fertilizer producers in Panama indicated that there is strong market potential for biochar.

"Some people are hesitant to invest because of how long it takes to produce returns" said Planting Empowerment co-founder Damion Croston, adding "Biochar could be a way to generate earlier income from the plantations, but is also interesting to us because it has a number of different end-uses. The MIT team did a great job of figuring out how to capitalize on biochar production and how we can use it in our own operations."

Planting Empowerment will begin thinning its plantations in 2011, and will set up a small, mobile biochar production unit to process the tree thinnings. Their goal is to work through each stage of the process - from felling the trees to producing finished fertilizer.

Download the full report (PDF)

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Planting Empowerment (PE) works to alleviate tropical deforestation and poverty through sustainably managed timber plantations. Founded by four former Peace Corps Volunteers in 2006, PE partners socially and environmentally minded investors with community-based forestry projects in Central America. Since its formation in 2006, Planting Empowerment has quickly grown to become a thought leader in sustainable development and a capable on-the-ground partner. PE currently has 50 acres of mixed tree species under cultivation, with plans to expand to 250 acres in 2011.

Kate Kirby, who has done a lot of extensive research on carbon emissions and land cover change with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama, completed a participatory mapping workshop in February with community members teaching them how to use GPS units to map coordinates of the forest reserve. This information along with historical knowledge from the community will be used to determine the rate of land cover change over time. When combined with data on carbon storage in different land cover types, this information will give the community the raw data needed to begin the process of estimating its carbon stocks.

Construction of the tree nursery is complete and the seedling trays have finally arrived from the manufacturer in Sweden. This week the community will begin the process of planting the seeds collected from the reserve into the seedling trays. The nursery will produce approximately 9,600 native species saplings which will be ready for transplant during planting season.

I enjoy John Stewart's digs at climate change naysayers as much as the next guy, but behind the sarcasm lies genuine frustration. I hope that as the science behind climate change solidifies, the skeptics will soften their positions and Stewart will have less reason to call them out.

The team visited PE's plantations, neighboring plantations, local sawmills, and interviewed the local population. They have focused on producing biochar from the waste. Biochar is formed by burning wood waste in a special oven through pyrolysis. The biochar can be either used as initial fertilizer in PE's future plantations or sold to local small farmers. We look forward to continue working with the MIT team to further develop the processing and mechanics of the business. Our first real "waste" thinnings will probably occur either this May or early in 2011.

Employee Liriano pruning a teak tree

A lot is happening in January with Planting Empowerment. The UNDP-GEF Small Grants Project continues with a study of the carbon stock of Arimae's reserve. Construction of the tree nursery is nearly completed, and the community is busy collecting seeds from old growth trees to plant.

MIT is sending down a group of MBA students to assess commercial uses for the tree thinnings that we will begin to produce in a few years. Possible applications include biochar and selling firewood to the community.

Additionally, a couple tree owners will join us to tour the communities and see their trees growing.