winter 2010 newsletter

Johnny Ipil-Seed News Vol. XVIII, No. 3

One of the primary focuses of Trees for the Future’s (TREES) program is responding to issues of food secu-rity. Haiti is a chronically food insecure country. Eighty percent of the population lives in the rural areas and are dependent upon the land for their livelihoods. However, Haiti is the most environmentally degraded country in the Western Hemisphere. Less than two percent of the forests remain and the majority of the land suffers from soil infertility. Not nearly enough food is produced to feed the people and one-third of the population is considered food inse-cure. Severe malnutrition affects large portions of the country and the re-cent catastrophic events have made the situation significantly worse. The current cholera epidemic is targeting the most vul-nerable in the society, the malnourished.

For almost ten years TREES has been work-ing with farmers to bring degraded lands back to productivity with the planting of trees and de-veloping more sustainable agriculture practices. In the past year, in response to the worsening situation, our program in Haiti has evolved dramatically to meet the short-term food needs of the people while developing long-term strategies to develop sustainable food pro-duction systems.

Thanks in large part to our partnership with the Yélé Haiti Foundation, TREES has created a team of ten lo-cals including professional agroforesters and agrono-mists who are working directly with the farmers in their fields. We have developed a major agriculture compo-nent to our program in which farmers are being trained to develop more sustainable agriculture practices on their farms, diversifying their crops, and integrating them with the planting of beneficial tree species. To

meet short term needs, TREES is also providing them with tools and local seeds including beans, sorghum, melons, pep-pers and eggplant. Farm-ers are extremely excited because within three months, they are already producing crops to meet their families' immediate food requirements.

TREES is also working with farmers to develop medium and long-term strategies to produce sufficient amounts of food on their land. The first goal is to regener-

ate degraded fields. Therefore, farmers are planting fast growing, nitrogen fixing trees to increase soil fertility. They are planting deep rooted trees and establishing windbreaks to decrease soil erosion from rain and the wind blowing the rich topsoil away. Farmers are al-ready experiencing higher agriculture yields on their

Haiti: Creating Sustainable Food Security Solutions

Continued, page 5

Winter 2010 Vol. XVIII, No. 3The quarterly newsletter of Trees for the Future

TREES assistant trainer Luckson Benoit filling agriculture seeds for community leaders to bring back to their villages

to help meet short term needs in our long term projects.

Johnny Ipil-Seed News


The Johnny Ipil-Seed News is a quarterly newsletter of TREES FOR THE FUTURE, Inc., a nonprofit organiza-tion dedicated to helping people of the world’s poorest communities to begin environmentally beneficial, self-help projects.

This newsletter is printed using wind energy on recycled paper with soy-based ink and is sent to all supporting members to inform them of recent events, plans, financial matters and how their support is helping people.

BOARD OF DIRECTORSDr. John R. Moore - Chairman, Dr. Peter Falk - Vice Chair-man, Mr. Oscar V. Gruspe - Finance Officer, Dave Deppner - President, Mr. Bedru Sultan, Ms. Marilou Herman, Mr. Franz Stuppard, Mr. John Leary - Members, R. Grace Deppner - Re-cording Secretary (non-voting)

ADVISORY COUNCILDr. Mizani Kristos - West African Development, Dr. James Brewbaker - University of Hawaii, Mr. William Campbell - Seasoned Energy, Mr. Steve McCrea - Global Climate Change, FL, Dr. Malcolm Novins - George Mason University, Dr. Noel Vietmeyer - The Vetiver Institute, Mr. Sean Griffin - Forestry & GIS Specialist.

STAFFDave Deppner - Founder, Executive Director

R. Grace Deppner - Founder, Associate DirectorJeffrey Manuel - Membership Services

Gorav Seth - International Programs CoordinatorJosh Bogart - Central America CoordinatorEthan Budiansky - West Africa Coordinator

Jeff Follett - South America CoordinatorFrancis Deppner - Southeast Asia Coordinator

David Tye - East Africa CoordinatorGabe Buttram - Greener Africa Coordinator

Catherine Bukowski - Training Program Coordinator

FIELD STAFFLouis Nkembi - Cameroon; Gerardo Santos Matta, Jose Hilario Osorio Giron, Guillermo Valle - Honduras; Sagapala Gangiset-ty, Manoj Bhatt, Aman Singh - India, Donal Perez - Nicaragua; Danny Zabala - Philippines; Omar Ndao, Karamba Diakhaby - Senegal; Kay Howe, Abdul Chamid - Indonesia; Fernanda Peixoto - Brazil; Paulino Damiano Mugendi, Dickson Omandi - Kenya; Mathius Lukwago - Uganda; Lovans Owusu-Takyi -Ghana; Robin Achah - Cameroon; Alexis Nitunga - Burundi; Timote Georges - Haiti; Mohamed Traore - Mali; Merkebu Garedew - Ethiopia; Juan Alberto - Colombia

TREES FOR THE FUTUREThe Loret Miller Ruppe Center for Sustainable Development

P.O. Box 7027, Silver Spring, MD 20907Toll Free: 1-800-643-0001: Ph: 301-565-0630

[email protected] WWW.PLANT-TREES.ORG

In This Newsletterp.1: Haiti: Creating Sustainable Food Security

Solutionsp.3: Opinion: Take A Look Around!p.4: Capacity Building in Ethiopiap.5: Haiti: Sustainable Food Security (continued)p.6: Uganda Scout Environment Cycling Campaign

Providing Seed for Honduran Coffee Producers Supports Wildlife

p.7: Long Term Investment in Wood and WildlifeHelping Train Peace Corps Volunteers in Ethiopia

p.8: A Truly Remarkable Tree: Moringa oleiferap.10: Empowering Volunteers and Community

Members in Ghanap.11: Planting Moringa Helps Provide Milk for School

Childrenp.12: New Projects in Colombia

TREES Responds to Cholera's Arrival to our Communities in Haiti

p.13: Introducing Judy PeabodyDon Bosco Makuyu Technical School, Kenya

p.14: Extending Training Outreach in the Philippinesp.15: In Brazil Every Year is Different

Senegal - Omar and Abdou with young Jatropha seed-lings. Senegal is widely promoting Jatropha cultivation

for biodiesel production, so TREES is working with farmers to integrate Jatropha into tree planting projects

along with a diverse mix of other species.


As 2010 draws toward a close, when many of you read this, there may be snow outside your window. Every year about this time, my thoughts turn to places where it doesn’t snow.

Despite the Copenhagen meeting, supposedly called to end the threat of climate change, despite the intro-duction of failed legisla-tion in our own Congress

to clean the air and to get away from a carbon energy based economy, we seem no closer to a workable plan to build this clean energy economy.

Nor does there seem to be any cooperative effort be-tween concerned nations toward reducing the carbon in our atmosphere, even though there is almost complete agreement that Carbon Dioxide and other “greenhouse gases” in our atmosphere are the primary cause of ris-ing seas, of increasingly violent storms, and of the ex-tended droughts that follow.

Perhaps the reason for inaction is that we continue to look at these threats individually. We fail to see the close relationships between climate, energy and the de-struction of the environment. We seem unable to un-derstand that these three threats, together, cause the growing devastation of the world’s agricultural base, the disappearance of safe water supplies, the decline in food security, and the increase in poverty, and that in much of the world all of this leads to widespread human migration from rural areas to the strife of urban slums. And, as Wangari Maathai points out, more and more wars are being fought over natural resources.

What has this to do with us? I think most of us are overlooking a tremendous opportunity not only to ad-dress an energy shortage and climate change, but also to help people in need. All of this results in bringing great benefit to our own environment—and to our economy.

I think most of us understand that with all the oil we import, we’re draining off enough capital to keep our own economy stunted, and keeping almost 10% of our own people jobless (or at least very under-employed). This is capital that could be turned into “green” en-ergy—and millions of jobs.

Much of that investment would, should, be at work right here at home. But we should also recognize its value as a great opportunity to help not only ourselves, but also the many millions of people who want to be our partners and our friends throughout the Developing World.

I believe the reason we’re not looking at this oppor-tunity is because, over the years, we have developed an “oil company mentality.” A mentality that thinks that if a product doesn’t come from deep within the earth, it’s not energy. That if it can’t be produced in large quanti-ties on a closely-controlled site, it’s nothing we care to use. A mentality that, as was so clearly demonstrated in the Gulf this summer, believes that whatever problems may arise, we can always “throw money at it”.

The coal and oil industries say the very idea of hun-dreds of thousands of small-scale families, completely on their own, each producing a few gallons of fuel per year, is not possible. And yet TREES projects are doing this, successfully, in several nations. That fuel is being used in these developing communities for a great num-ber of energy needs. It’s sparking new ideas and new industries.

Unfortunately, this new idea is not encouraging inves-tors. But consider that without this production of green energy, a continuously growing number of people must rely on fossil fuels, imported at a huge cost into these impoverished lands, despite their ever-shrinking supply of hard currency. Instead, these people should be able to produce much of their needed fuel right at home, but until these countries have this ability, these faraway vil-lages will continue to be in serious competition with us.

Investors should also consider the many side benefits that we could be getting but are not: the tremendous tonnage of carbon stored as biomass, the protection of fragile uplands, the assured supply of safe drinking wa-ter, the reduced threat of flooding and all of the other environmental benefits that will be realized if we, as a country, are willing to take a good look around and see people who want to be our friends.

Opinion: Take A Look Around!


Since beginning our work in Ethiopia in 2003, Trees for the Future and our local partner Greener Ethiopia have planted well over 10 million trees to reduce pres-sure on existing forests, to restore or enhance produc-tivity of the land, and to improve food security at the household level. For a relatively small, grassroots proj-ect, working with limited resources and only a few full-time staff members, this is a remarkable achievement.

TREES' program goes beyond simply planting trees though. We realize that if Ethiopians are to change the current pattern of unsustainable land-use practices, it is important to understand which practices are particular-ly problematic, to identify the most appropriate and ef-fective solutions to address and change these practices, and to create and maintain synergies with all stakehold-ers in order to extend these findings to as many land-users as possible. To be effective, this requires close collaboration with community participants, project partners and appropriate government agencies during every step of the process, from planning, to training, to implementation, through to monitoring and evaluation of project activities, challenges and accomplishments.

With this in mind, TREES and GE organized and facilitated a three-day capacity building workshop on November 22-24, 2010. The event was held in Wol-kite, one of their project areas in the Guraghe Zone. Along with GE, we brought our project coordinators and nursery managers to the workshop. We also invited many of our stakeholders who collaborate directly with the projects, including Development Agents and Sub-ject Matter Specialists from the Bureau of Agriculture and Rural Development, as well as some particularly motivated, small-holder farmers receiving support, and school teachers who are directly involved in the Green Clubs that they are establishing.

Altogether, 33 people participated in the workshop. The three days were chalked full of various activities. On the first morning, after getting to know each other, participants shared their experiences from the past year, discussing the challenges, accomplishments, strengths and weaknesses of each project. Through group activi-ties they shared stories and provided useful feedback for ways to improve the projects in the future. In the af-ternoon, they were presented with TREES’/GE’s goals and objectives for the coming year, and given the op-portunity to comment and make suggestions.

The second day was set aside for technical training

and skill building. In the morning, the participants were split into several groups to define and depict various agroforestry and sustainable land management systems that are most appropriate for Ethiopia, focusing on the design and composition of each system. Each group then presented their findings to everyone for discus-sion. The afternoon was spent at TREES’/GE’s Kat-bare nursery site, where participants learned about the importance of grafting for improved fruit production, and were given a demonstration on three useful grafting techniques.

Since an important component of the work that Trees for the Future pursues is based on community inter-action, participation and learning, the morning of the third day was set aside for a presentation and discus-sion on communication methodologies. This session

Capacity Building in Ethiopia

Terekegn, TREES'/GE's technician in Konso, demon-strates grafting techniques during the technical portion of a three-day stakeholders' training and workshop in

Guraghe Zone, Ethiopia


previously severely degraded lands that had often been abandoned.

Another major goal is to work with farmers to diver-sify food production in their fields. In addition to di-versifying their crops, many farmers are planting fruit trees in their fields and are learning how to graft im-proved varieties of mangoes and citrus. Within three to five years they can expect to harvest nutrient rich fruits such as mangos, citrus and guavas.

Farmers are planting some trees such as Moringa oleifera, known in Creole as Benzolive, which can play a significant role in combating malnutrition. Within six months, the Moringa tree produces a steady supple of edible leaves which are rich in beta carotene, iron, pro-tein and potassium. They can be used in sauces to help improve health, especially of infants and nursing moth-ers.

Finally, over 80% of the Haitian population lives in poverty and of these over 50% are in abject poverty. Increasing the income of the farmers will help them and their families meet their health and nutrition needs. TREES is working with the farmers to develop income generating activities such as producing surpluses in crop and fruit yields to sell in the market, growing fuel-wood and construction materials, and raising livestock. With the added income, families can diversify their di-ets and purchase needed medicines.

In 2010 alone, Trees for the Future assisted Haitian farmers in planting over two million trees. Over 300

farmers took part in the tree planting and sustainable agriculture programs and 500 families directly benefit-ed from our work in Haiti. While our success in Haiti has been very encouraging, it still affects a small por-tion of the population and the overall need of the coun-try. We are asking our members to continue supporting our efforts in Haiti so that we can reach the thousands of families asking for our assistance in regions through-out the country. So far, our program has impacted many lives, but our work is far from over.

covered best practices and useful guidelines for adult learning and training facilitation. We then moved on to administrative activities that are fundamental to the program’s success, including record keeping, reporting and monitoring and evaluation. The last block of the workshop was devoted to developing an action plan for 2011. During this time, participants were grouped ac-cording to their project areas. After reviewing the proj-ect objectives for their areas, they began scheduling activities, identifying targets, and delineating roles and responsibilities for each stakeholder.

At the end of the three days, participants were in high spirits. During evaluation, they expressed their ap-preciation for the opportunity to get together to meet others around the country who are undertaking similar work, to share experiences and to learn from one an-other. Though they are all working with Trees for the

Future and Greener Ethiopia, this is the first time many of them had met. Afterwards, they expressed that they feel like more of a team now, and are encouraged by the fact that they are all working collectively to protect and conserve Ethiopia.

Most importantly, the participants expressed that this was a very useful and productive workshop. They are all confident in taking the skills they have learned and the experiences they have shared back with them to their communities and to their work. In 2011 each of these participants will play an important role in the implementation of TREES’/GE’s program.

Having better-identified and defined our strengths, weaknesses, and a way forward, and after further devel-oping the capacities of our technicians and stakehold-ers, we are confident that our Ethiopia program will see great success in 2011.

Haiti: Sustainable Food Security (continued from page 1)

TREES agriculture program provides farmers with seeds of corn, beans, sorghum, melons and eggplant.


We have seen a major increase in project requests to plant timber species in coffee systems in 2010. In col-laboration with our partners, we have been discussing ways to improve upon this system, and have decided to work more with trees which are multi-use, and provide additional benefits besides timber.

One exceptional multi-use species is Juglans olan-chana, which provides a nut for human or animal con-sumption. Also, if some of these nuts are left in the coffee plantations, the local wildlife will take great ad-vantage of them.

Other multi-use species are in the Guarea genus, whose seeds provide a smorgasbord for wild birds (tou-cans, parrots, wild pigeons) and for a variety of rodents (agoutis, squirrels, etc). Magnolia yoroconte is another

species that is adaptable to coffee production systems. Due to its thin crown, it takes advantage of small holes in the forest canopy, while providing nectar for bees and seeds for small mammals.

We currently have a request for more than 50,000 seeds of Juglans, and more than 5,000 seeds of Guarea, but because the production season is in the months of November and December, we are requesting funds now to buy seed from local farmers who have such trees on their land. Through this program we are also giving people a reason to protect their adult trees, as they are a potential source of income. We hope to expand this program to utilize seeds of other species which provide similar benefits, wherever we can find good genetic stock.

The Uganda Scout Association has established a Cycle for Peace and Environment Campaign aimed at promoting tree planting throughout Uganda. The Uganda Scouts Cycling Group bikes to different parts of Uganda to distribute tree seeds, conduct workshops, and educate local communities on the importance of tree planting.

Trees for the Future has provided funds to the Uganda Counts Cycling Program for the purchase of tools at sites where they are planting trees and educating com-munities. Trees for the Future also supplied tree seeds

and conducted a workshop to train members of the Cy-cling Program on tree nursery management and agro-forestry techniques.

The Cycling Team Scouts have facilitated weekend workshops in different districts in Uganda, including: Entebbe, Luwero, Sironko, Gulu and Wakiso. During these workshops, they participate in tree planting and community sensitization on the importance of plant-ing trees and improving the local environment. This campaign is aimed at creating awareness—the world over— about the rate at which the worlds’ forests are being destroyed, and encouraging efforts to rededicate people to reverse the situation.

The Cycling Campaign is also in the process of rais-ing funds to do a cycling trip to Sweden in July 2011, a 16,000 kilometer trip, to participate in the 22nd World Scout Jamboree. The route will take the Scouts from Uganda to Kenya, Ethiopia, Sudan, Egypt, Libya, Italy, Germany, Switzerland, Denmark and Sweden. As the Cycling Group passes through many of these countries, they will call attention to the importance of tree plant-ing and environmental conservation.

The Uganda Scouts Cycling Group have cycled to Bushenyi, Misori, Entebbe, Nairobi, Kenya, as well as Gulu, Luwero, Sironko and Lira.

This campaign is geared toward Uganda scouts cele-brating 100 years of scouting (2015), where every scout in Uganda will be encouraged to plant 100 trees every year from 2011-2015.

Uganda Scout Environment Cycling Campaign

Ugandan Scout, Ronald Bwire and several children plant trees at Misori Village near Entebber, Uganda.

The Uganda Scouts Cycling Program travels through-out Uganda planting trees and educating communities

on their importance to the local environment.

Providing Seed for Honduran Coffee Producers Supports Wildlife


Guarea spp are known in Honduras by their common names of "marapolan", "carbon", and "cola de pava". These species improve the soil of coffee fields by pulling nutrients from deep within the soil and depositing them on the soil surface when they drop their leaves and branches. These nutrients are then absorbed by coffee plants which grow better quality coffee beans. In addition, Guarea spp provide timber which is commonly accepted as a replacement for mahogany.

People in the United States often hear about bird friendly, shade-grown, and other certified coffee. The Guarea spp is an important species for these certifications. Guarea seeds are used by two different groups of animals. Large birds, including several species of toucans, parrots, wild pigeons, and even the endangered quetzal, eat an oily substance from around the seeds. The seeds are then dropped to the forest floor where they are picked up by many species of rodents, including squirrels, and members of the genera Dasyprocta and Cuniculus—both of which are considered threatened.

By planting Guarea spp, farmers participating in TREES projects can develop alternative incomes while also providing crucial habitat for threatened and endangered species.

Long Term Investment in Wood and Wildlife

Thirty-three U.S. Peace Corps Trainees have arrived in Ethiopia to become the country’s first group of Con-servation and Natural Resource Management Volun-teers. In December they will have completed ten weeks of language, cultural and technical training, and will be sworn-in as Peace Corps Volunteers.

TREES’ Ethiopia Program Coordinator Gabriel But-tram was recently invited to their training site to give a two day training session on agroforestry practices, and nursery development and man-agement to the volunteers, and Peace Corps staff members.

During the session they discussed ways to address the country's press-ing environmental and humanitar-ian issues through planting trees and managing natural resources more sus-tainably. The trainees were also given the chance to build both potted and bare-root seedling beds. At the end of the two days, the trainees were en-thusiastically discussing agroforestry project ideas, and eagerly awaiting their assignments.

These volunteers have made a great commitment and will soon be as-signed to communities around the country where they will live and work for the next two years. By early next year, the majority of them will be starting tree nurseries with their counterparts and community groups,

in order to restore degraded land and provide useful tree-based products for communities wishing to im-prove their livelihoods.

Soon, they will begin planting trees alongside their new friends and neighbors. During this time, TREES will continue to offer its support, and provide on-site technical assistance, seeds and other planting materi-als to help ensure the success and sustainability of their projects.

Helping Train Peace Corps Volunteers in Ethiopia

The first group of Conservation and Natural Resource Management Trainees arrived for their training with Peace Corps. Trees for the Future facilitated a 2 day workshop on agroforestry and nursery management.


Moringa oleifera, a remarkable tree that grows in most of the countries in which Trees for the Future operates, is known by many names: ‘shiferaw’ in Ethiopia, ‘murungai’ in India, ‘malunggay’ in The Philippines, or ‘marango’ in Latin America. Moringa oleifera’s unique and valuable qualities make it a powerful tool in fighting poverty and malnutrition, and we think that you may find it interesting to learn more about this wonderful tree and how it is being used across so many of our programs.

Originally native to India and areas of the Middle-East, Moringa oleifera is one of thirteen species in the genus Moringa and is the species used most extensively in TREES' programs. This species is well adapted to drought, but can also grow in humid areas. It can rapidly grow to over 30 feet, but will vigorously grow back when cop-piced to harvest leaves. The pods, the leaves, and the roots are edible, and are major components of the diet in some countries. With proper management, leaves can be harvested every 4 months and edible pods every 12 months. Other useful products of the Moringa tree include: flowers used for beekeeping, thick fiber used for ropes and textiles, and natural medicines including antibiotics and fungicides.

In southern Ethiopia Moringa is often referred to as the 'cabbage tree.' It thrives in the arid, mountainous home of the Konso people, where it has long been depended on for its leaves, which are cooked like cabbage, and are used as a primary source of food where other vegetables can be difficult to grow. In Konso, Moringa trees are found around nearly every homestead, where they also provide shade from the hot sun. Appreciation for Moringa is quickly spreading across Ethiopia, in no small part through the work of Trees for the Future, as we are promot-ing its use and planting it by the tens of thousands in the majority of our projects.

In southern Brazil, Moringa is the cornerstone for several projects focused on improving nutrition. Participants are harvesting Moringa leaves at least twice per year to make a dry leaf-powder that can be added to other foods to increase nutritional content. One hundred grams of Moringa powder supplies as much vitamin C as an orange, as much calcium as a glass of milk, and as much protein as one egg. This has a profound impact on the health of

A Truly Remarkable Tree: Moringa oleifera

Moringa stand in Honduras (left) and in Haiti (right). In Haiti, Mrs. Jones feeds her children soup made from Moringa leaves every morning to improve their nutrition.


Moringa oleifera is grown by people around the world for its outstanding qualities. (left - Kenya, right - Ethiopia)

children and mothers, and therefore Moringa is being grown on several school properties for use in the cafeteria. Also edible are the peas contained in its long seed pods, as well as an oil which is extracted for cooking and is used on salads.

"Benzolive", as Moringa is referred to in Creole, is playing an increasingly important role in combating the seri-ous malnutrition which afflicts a large portion of the Haitian population. Women cook the leaves in soups or add them to salads to feed to their children. Pregnant and lactating mothers have said that Moringa leaves increase the health of their newborn children, and increase their supply of breast milk. In other cases, people consume the leaves to treat anemia. TREES programs in Haiti are helping to expand the knowledge and availability of Mor-inga to new communities.

In Honduras, Moringa is not well known for human consumption, but Trees for the Future is encouraging par-ticipants to use it to provide fodder to boost dairy output in a program aimed at providing school children with milk (see article on page 11). When used as cattle feed, Moringa provides a generous supply of edible leaves that can increase livestock meat and dairy yields. This cut-and-carry system helps protect fragile lands by offering a profitable alternative to the detrimental effects of overgrazing.

With its fast growth rate, Moringa is being employed in Nicaragua as a nurse tree to provide a quick source of shade in arid environments which are in the initial stages of being reforested. Moringa can withstand the harsh conditions and creates a favorable micro-climate for other species to take root, thus jump starting the process of regenerative succession which leads to the reestablishment of forests.

In Senegal, Moringa leaves are pounded with groundnut (peanut) and chilies to make a highly nutritious "leaf sauce" that is eaten with rice; thus providing vitamins and protein to balance out the diet. In India, it is the pods that are most highly valued, as these are a popular ingredient in South Indian curries.

Whether cooked, dried, or eaten raw, Moringa’s leaves provide essential nutrition for people around the world. As you can see from the examples above, it is an important component in our fight against poverty and malnutri-tion. You can expect to hear more about this amazing tree as we continue to incorporate it into our projects.


The TREES Ghana program has been highlighted recently in two Ghanian news websites: GhanaWeb (www.ghanaweb.com) and Business Ghana 9 (www.businessghana.com), for tree planting efforts with local schools. The program promotes forming environmen-tal groups under the name Tree Pals for school nursery projects. TREES donated 5,000 seedlings each, to eight schools at Chiraa, in the Brong Ahafo Region, to enable them to raise tree nurseries. The donation was made at a workshop which attracted about 328 pupils and 16 teachers. This workshop was aimed to educate the par-ticipants about the importance of tree planting, agroforestry and school gar-dening to enhance food security and environmental conversation..

Also in Chiraa, TREES has been developing a partnership with the Ja-pan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), which sends volunteers to developing countries for two years in a program similar to the U.S. Peace Corps program. TREES will be sup-porting two JICA volunteers, Naomi Ishida and Shoko Mori, to launch a tree planting and school gardening ini-tiative with schools to plant 100 seed-lings in each academic facility. In ad-dition to helping JICA volunteers, two new Peace Corps groups in Education and Water and Sanitation are being welcomed by TREES Ghana to support community nurseries. The community coun-terparts of the volunteers were provided with watering cans and seeds to start community nurseries for 2011.

In addition to helping JICA volunteers and their com-munities, TREES continues to strengthen its relation-ship with Peace Corps Ghana. The new group of 27 Education volunteers and their community partners received training in agroforestry technologies, nursery establishment and maintenance, seed treatment, garden-ing skills and tree species identification. Lovans Owu-su-Takyi, the Ghana program coordinator, supplied the counterparts with watering cans and tree seeds to en-courage the volunteers to start Tree Pals environmental groups in the schools where they worked, to facilitate teaching children about the environment and sustain-able agricultural practices.

Mr. Owusu-Takyi also participated in a more techni-

cal training with the new Peace Corps Environment and Alternative Livelihoods volunteers at the Kumasi Insti-tute of Tropical Agriculture (KITA) where Mr. Owusu-Takyi is involved with the institute’s management and classes. KITA is one of TREES strongest partners in Ghana. KITA students are introduced to TREES during their first year of studies. They are given our training manual as an introduction to agroforestry and are pro-vided with small plots of land to practice the techniques they learn. This allows the students to gain practical ex-perience they can use when they graduate. The students

are encouraged to read our manual and take the exam for certification. So many students participated this year that we have now devised a system where KITA professors will partici-pate in grading the exams and provide feedback to quicken the response.

Armed with technical expertise and practical experience, the KITA stu-dents are given seeds to start commu-nity or school nurseries in their home villages when they are on breaks in between semesters. This often turns into an important experience in the students’ education. Students gain two advantages; first they have the oppor-tunity to show their community new

things and what they are studying in school, and second they gain the experience of being a leader in the com-munity and practicing what they have learned about sustainable agriculture to make a positive impact in their local schools and with village farmers.

These experiences help the students to better under-stand their subject material and equip them to excel in their year of national service after they graduate. One such KITA graduate student that actively participated in TREES programs, Michael Boney, recently acquired the job of Field Projects Supervisor with the Ghana Rub-ber Estates Company Limited at Takoradi. Boney stud-ied the long-distance training program manual, passed his exam and received his certificate while studying at KITA. After he graduated, he participated in a year of National Youth Service where recent graduates are placed in communities to help with development. He was stationed at Sarponso Junior high school together with George Ansah (TREES Ghana program coordina-

Empowering Volunteers and Community Members in Ghana

Armed with tech-nical expertise and practical experi-ence, the KITA students are given seeds to start com-munity or school nurseries in their

home villages


tor assistant) where they both taught. They constructed a nursery of 15,000 seedlings and planted 1,800 trees in the school compound. They distrib-uted 3,000 seedlings of Moringa to the students to plant in their homes and family farms. They also set up a school garden for the students. Boney did a project for TREES in his home-town at Jasikan in the Volta region as well. We has established two nurser-ies in this region, where he worked with two Tree Pals schools to trans-plant 500 seedlings.

Boney expressed to Mr. Owusu-Takyi that during his interview, many of the questions asked were centered along the work he was doing with TREES. He believes that the report he gave of his hard work with his proj-ects TREES supported, coupled with his TREES certificate, made him the preferred choice.

The TREES long-distance training program has received about 260 participants in 2010, which is a large in-crease from the approximately 175 in 2009. The program is constantly evolving and improving to meet the needs of our expanding projects. The example of Michael Boney shows that the training program can often have long-lasting effects and benefits for our participants due not only to teaching them about sustainable agriculture practices, but also by encouraging them to become future leaders in positions where they can make a positive im-pact. Boney has expressed interest in starting tree nurseries in the new community where he is stationed with the Rubber Estates Company, and to continue to teach his new coworkers and others about incorporating agroforestry practices into their farms.

In Honduras, the Healthy Schools Program works with more than 5,000 schools in the poorest parts of the country. In 2010 Healthy Schools started a project called “glass of milk,” which is designed to provide 200 ml of milk to students in kindergarten daily. Through this project the national government supplies money to local school districts so they can buy milk from local farmers, thereby keeping the money in the local econ-omy.

Many of the farmers involved in the project raised a fear that in the dry season their milk production will fall off due to lack of high quality forage. The staff at Healthy Schools brought this problem to the local staff at Trees for the Future, and it was decided to try a program where all involved would benefit. Healthy

Schools has therefore begun planting 40,000 Moringa oleifera seedlings on school properties. Leaves from these plants will be harvested by students and sold to cattle farmers as a feed supplement, and the result-ing income will be used for school activities. In this way farmers will be able to maintain milk production through the dry season, the schools will be able to gain income for activities with students, and the students will receive their supply of milk.

Moringa was chosen for its acceptance by cows, the high quality of its fodder, as well as its fast growth rate, which will allow for initial cuttings by February of 2011. In the coming years these forage trees plots will be diversified with other tree species to increase the sustainability of the system.

Planting Moringa Helps Provide Milk for School Children

Members of the Kokoben Tree Pals club are dedicated to making their school compound more green. They transplant new seedlings in the areas

where seedlings did not survive from a planting earlier in the year.


Eight months ago, Cristina Velez contacted South America Program Officer Jeff Follett about starting agroforestry projects in Colombia. After spending time pursuing her education in Canada, Cristina returned to her home country of Colombia. Despite the demands of her full-time job, she devoted her “spare time” to developing an agro-forestry program near Urrao. Cristina chose Urrao not only because it is near to her home-town, but also because of the rate of forest loss in the area. Despite the fact that forests cover about 60 percent of the area—due to a lack of economic opportuni-ties—people continue to unsustainably harvest trees. For many people, selling trees is the only source of available income. In addition, many families rely on wood for cooking-fuel. All of this leads to greater de-forestation rates. As a result, streams and other water sources have been contaminated by pollutants, soil ero-sion has increased, and springs are drying up due to lowering ground water levels.

In response, Cristina and Jeff developed a program plan to start projects in the area. The key to the pro-

gram's initial success was finding a capable technician named Juan Alberto. His dedication to teaching agro-forestry skills, and his constant contact with the five project communities has been essential in the beginning

stages of the training program. In the five months since it began, it has already gradu-ated 60 people from the agroforestry train-ing course, has started five community nurs-eries, and has distrib-uted 50,000 seeds and seedlings. In addition, Juan Alberto has start-ed worm composting projects—which helps to further improve soil conditions—in each of the communities.

The communities were initially skeptical

of our efforts because they have so often seen orga-nizations come to town and not follow through with their promises. Your support and the hard work of the Colombian team has allowed us to overcome the com-munities' initial concerns. We are excited about our achievements to date and would like to thank you for your contribution to these efforts. With your help, we will be able to continue to work with Juan Alberto and these five communities in 2011.

New Projects in Colombia

Sadly, on November 10, we got news that the first per-son connected with the TREES program died of chol-era. He was a farmer in Mapou, Gonaïves, a local lead-er and a strong participant in the Yélé-Vert program—a partnership between TREES and Yélé Haiti. He was deeply involved in the central nursery serving farmers in Gonaïves.

In response to this desperate situation brought on by the recent cholera outbreak, we are collaborating with the Ýélé Foundation, and Partners in Health to provide training to the farmers on sanitation and cholera pre-vention and treatment. We will also be providing farm-

ers with hand soap and chlorine tabs. We are currently establishing a partnership with another organization to provide chlorinators to the communities in order to pu-rify drinking water.

Following the January earthquake, we collaborated with local partners in Haiti to get medical supplies to many of the communities desperate for assistance. We also received one-thousand boxes of emergency milk formula from Viva SA, a local dairy company. The milk was provided to school children in our project areas in order to combat severe malnutrition. We are grateful to Yélé Haiti for providing storage space for the supplies.

TREES Responds to Cholera's Arrival to our Communities in Haiti

TREES' works to restore and protect the environment by re-turning trees to degraded lands


Judy Peabody has been enthusiastically volunteering in the TREES office since fall 2008. For a few hours every week she is hard at work packaging seeds, up-loading pictures to the TREES flickr account, and or-ganizing the seed supply. She was first introduced to Trees for the Future when a friend gave her a tree planting certificate for Christmas.

“I was inspired by the TREES program and wanted to be in-volved,” she says.

When sealing a package of tree seeds she imagines them growing in a nurs-ery, “thousands of little plants ready to be transplanted into their permanent

homes,” she says.Since moving from Washington State to Washington

DC in 1960, she has worked as a homemaker, junior high school math teacher, and a landscape designer. She

finds a natural con-nection between her interest in landscape design, and sustain-able agrifarming. In her spare time Judy enjoys drawing bo-tanical illustrations, growing organic vegetables, and mon-itoring at the Smith-soinan Institution.

Thank you, Judy, from the thousands of rural villages who benefit from the tree seeds that have passed through your hands.

Introducing Judy Peabody

Maranga, Kenya, where most farmers are coffee growers, the Don Bosco Makuyu Technical School of-fers apprenticeships in various fields and it caters to students from poor families who cannot afford to pay secondary school fees. The school helps encourage students who don’t have many other opportu-nities to develop valuable skills, including adopting better agricul-tural practices and environmental management.

Trees for the Future has been in-vited by the institute’s principal, Mr. Darmian Formosa, to work with the school’s Agricultural Club on tree planting activities. Students established a tree nursery at the technical college site, where they raised Moringa oleifera, Leu-caena leucocephala, Sesbania ses-ban, and other tree seedlings. The

project has been very successful and the students were able to raise over 1,000 seedlings which they planted near their homes.

Paulino Damiano, the Kenya Program Coordinator for Trees for the Future, organized a one-day workshop on nursery es-tablishment and management. Stu-dents were impressed upon learn-ing about the various benefits of Moringa oleifera trees, including nutritional and medicinal qualities for use by people and so each de-cided to plant at least ten Moringa seedlings at their homes, in order to help meet the daily needs of their families. Additionally, these stu-dents are learning the importance of planting not only Moringa trees on farms and near homesteads, but of various different agroforestry tree species.

Don Bosco Makuyu Technical School, Kenya

Judy hard at work sealing bags of seeds of many tree species soon to be planted around the world.

4K Club students at Don Bosco Makuyu filling polythene tubes with soil.


This planting season has been very hectic for our partners in the Philippines after much rain fell in the form of typhoons which were followed by 6 months of no rain at all. Despite these adverse weather conditions, TREES Philippines, our main partner there, was able to plant 200,000 trees, more than twice as many as last year.

Our group in Zambales has worked extensively with local individuals, organizations, and the government to gain more notoriety and assistance in their tree planting efforts. It wasn’t hard to convince people to join them, as last years typhoons caused flooding that destroyed homes, businesses and government buildings, and have permanently displaced many families. The loss of tree cover on the nearby mountains has taken away the soils' ability to absorb water, which contributed to the rivers' overflow. Last years floods broke a dike, causing the evacuation of all those residing in the lowlands. Some of those displaced by last years floods have relocated near our out-planting sites and have volunteered as for-est guards who keep watch and put out wildfires in the dry season, as well as help with transplanting seedlings from nurseries to different sites during the rainy season.

The local government has donated the use of a build-ing near our sites to hold meetings, training sessions,

and demonstrations for local schools, organizations, and others interested in supporting tree planting efforts in the uplands of Zamables. Interest is catching on, as over 2,000 people attended a recent function.

These training and information sessions attract people from other towns and villages, who take the knowledge and experience they have gained and start projects of their own, and in turn train others in their community.

Our group there has created what they refer to as the “Zambales Model,” which is based on Trees for the Future’s Forest Garden Concept. It incorporates raising cash crops and livestock beneath a canopy of fast grow-ing, multi purpose trees. When done sustainably, this can provide food, shelter and income.

These techniques are especially important, as most of the villagers in the surrounding communities rely on firewood as a source of heat energy. Through training sessions, we are able to show them that they can sus-tainably harvest firewood by cutting only a few branch-es rather than cutting down an entire tree.

New sites are being created all of the time by locals who have accepted that trees need to be planted and that diversification in the crops they plant is necessary, as the start and end of the seasons are becoming less and less predictable.

Extending Training Outreach in The Philippines

Volunteers from local grade schools and universities enthusiastically assist with transplanting seedlings at the Ino-sari farm site. Loobunga, Zambales, Philippines.


In four trips to Brazil, South America Program Of-ficer Jeff Follett had never seen the extent of how dry conditions can become within our project area.

When he was recently there some areas had not seen a drop of water for over 120 days. Initially, Jeff thought it was cloudy when he arrived, yet later realized that it was simply smoke and soot hovering in the air. Each evening as the moon rose, it was a brilliant shade of red due to its glow shimmering through the smoke and ash. In stark contrast, recent storms have brought above nor-mal precipitation, thus leading to difficulties in main-taining nurseries and protecting seedlings.

This is the context in which we work: continued vari-ability. Every year for the past three years we have faced completely different weather conditions in our efforts to address conservation issues and low agri-cultural production. Despite the challenges, our team has continued to build local agroforestry knowledge through workshops and site visits. This year alone, in Brazil, we have:

• Conducted 35 training workshops that reached nearly 300 producers.

• Distributed over 500,000 tree seeds.• Transplanted 190,000 tree seedlings.• Visited nearly 60% of project participants on

their land.• Publicly posted hundreds of pictures, stories, and

GPS points about our work there, to guarantee transparency.

We also had the pleasure of conducing site visits with Danielle Weiss, the program manager of Planeterra, our 2009 program donor. In addition, individual donors,

Scott Vineberg and Mari Larangeira visited Brazil Co-ordinator Fernanda Peixoto, and toured many of our project sites. Our visitors’ positive feedback provides verification of the great work that is being done, and encourages the wonderful team we have working on the program.

While in Brazil, Jeff visited Luiza and Azerildo’s project that we have been following closely in our pub-lications since 2008. At that time, Luiza and Azerildo started a nursery of leucaena and moringa trees to feed and shade their cows. The moringa has not grown very well due to constant ant attacks, but the leucaena has done very well, and Luiza cuts the leaves to supple-ment her cows' diet. After feeding the cows leucaena, she had the milk tested and found that the protein level was actually too high in the milk. This was because Lu-iza did not decrease the protein meal that she was feed-ing her cows. It means that in the future, when Luiza has enough leucaena, she will be able to replace the expensive protein meal with leucaena fodder.

In 2011 we will continue to focus on increasing and diversifying farmers’ production, and conserving water and soil. We now have three year’s of experience and trust built in the communities, have a dedicated group of well-trained individuals, and have a local technician team that provides daily assistance to project partici-pants, but only with your continued support in 2011 will we be able sustain projects with farmers like Luiza and Azerildo.

Thank you from Fernanda, Jeff, and the rest of the TREES Brazil team.

In Brazil Every Year is Different

Pictures from southern Brazil showing (from left to right); a destroyed sugar cane field on Elsa's property, Vitoria by her moringa plot, Jose Leao's live fence, the dry conditions in the area, and Luiza and Azerildo's leucaena plot.

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