Help us build a Guatemalan community reforestation and education centre!
Fundraising campaign by
Baltazar Giron
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£9,367.00raised of £9,000.00 goal goal
THANK YOU! WE HAVE ALREADY RAISED OVER 75% OF THE FUNDS THAT WE NEED AND HAVE MADE A HUGE AMOUNT OF PROGRESS WITH OUR CONSTRUCTION AND PERMACULTURE SET UP
But today, we urgently need your help to get us over the finish line and complete the construction of our Education Centre
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If you would like to donate to us directly via PayPal (via this option we receive 100% of your donation as we don't lose any money to fees) please find us through:
https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/orgsolyverde
Every donation makes a world of difference, thank you!
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We are Baltazar and Emanuel, a Guatemalan father-and-son conservationist duo, directors of the non-profit Organizacion Ecologica Sol y Verde. Together with a committee of local leaders in nature restoration, our women's empowerment group, our ecological youth groups, and many volunteers we are working to restore tropical biodiversity, combat climate change and develop resilient, low-impact methods of living and working in the forest. We work in the forest region of Peten, Guatemala.
To share our work with as many people as possible, we are building Peten's first community-run Ecological Education Centre, with a classroom buildings and demonstration permaculture plots. At the Centre we are teaching ecological restoration, regenerative agriculture and bioconstruction to our local campesinos.
You can read more about us and our work on our website, Instagram and facebook or see where we are on the map with Restor and Google Maps
What are we fighting for?
The largest tropical forest in the Americas north of the Amazon, known as the Selva Maya, is losing over 100,000 acres per year to land grabs, cattle ranching and slash and burn agriculture. The extreme deforestation and agrochemical use causes huge areas to become infertile, exacerbating rural poverty, and leaving local farmers and indigenous families with few options other than migration.
We are reversing these trends of land degradation and livelihood insecurity by advancing community centered regenerative agriculture and forestry, sustainable ecotourism, ancestral Mayan organic practices and environmental education in rural villages.
By improving the quality and sustainability of life in forest communities, while protecting one of Earth’s most biodiverse places, we put People and Planet in harmony first.
What is the project and why do we need your help?
We are growing our restoration education programme by building a new space and expanding our permaculture food forest. We were recently donated a piece of degraded land and your support is helping us restore and transform this into a Ecological Education Centre run by and for local people.
The Centre is providing learning opportunities for all ages, focussing on Mayan permaculture, bioconstruction, self-sustainability, organic gardening, waste/recycling management, eco-building, natural medicine, conservation, creativity, female empowerment, wellbeing and much more.
The buildings (learning space, communal kitchen, library, accommodation, storage shed) will be made of adobe, cob, wattle and daub, wood and bamboo. We are exploring traditional and innovative ways of building with the earth and with agricultural byproducts, to become a precedent in the region for bioconstruction and community building.
The permaculture food forest is restoring a degraded hillside with native, culturally important species including shade-grown cacao, vanilla, ginger, turmeric, agroforestry trees, and medicinal plants. We are also growing a tree nursery to donate plants to local families.
In early 2023 we generously received £7,000 in donations, please see the video and photos at the top to learn how it was used throughout the year. In 2024, donations that we receive will go to:
- Completing (almost done!!) the construction of our natural build classroom and eco bathroom with a team of local artisans
- Furnishing our classroom with desks and chairs and learning resources for our youth education groups
- Supporting our local Directors to cover their basic needs, until the project is economically self-sustainable
- Setting up a resilient water capture and storage system to survive the dry season
If you would like your donation to go to one of these goals in particular, please simply add a comment with your donation to let us know which one!
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If you'd like to volunteer at the project and come help us build the school, please visit our WWOOF page at: https://tinyurl.com/dznacet7
Milestones
3/3
1. Initial crowdfunding goal
This covers a full year of salary for our two directors, water connection to the site, permaculture infrastructure and initial construction costs!
2. Education Centre first 50%
This covers the first half of the construction for our Education Centre, the set up of our Agroforestry Orchard and the running of initial education programs
3. Complete our Classroom
With this, we are able to fully finish our ecology class, the first out of our 2 buildings for our community centre!
Donors
- Naza Alakija
- Donated on Mar 15, 2024
- Emma Phillips
- Donated on Feb 12, 2024
Gives me hope for our future to see projects like yours
- Vincent Boursier
- Donated on Jan 13, 2024
Our Education Centre is almost complete!
Update posted by Baltazar Giron at 09:02 pmThank you so much for donating to our campaign in 2023, we are so grateful for your support. Because of your donations we have been able to realise our dreams and start building our Ecological Education Centre where we will be teaching permaculture, conservation and sustainability to local women's and. . . . .
Donors & Comments
- Naza Alakija
- Donated on Mar 15, 2024
- Emma Phillips
- Donated on Feb 12, 2024
Gives me hope for our future to see projects like yours
- Vincent Boursier
- Donated on Jan 13, 2024
- Christian Jochnick
- Donated on Dec 29, 2023
- Michael Frayn
- Donated on Dec 26, 2023
- Uri Fruchtmann
- Donated on Dec 26, 2023
- Uri Fruchtmann
- Donated on Dec 24, 2023
- Anonymous
- Donated on Mar 18, 2023
Incredible mission. Looking forward to the results!
- Anonymous
- Donated on Mar 18, 2023
From the regenerative design collective fund! Sending you all lots of love, thank you for this work
- Isabella Noero
- Donated on Feb 20, 2023
Amazing work! 🌱🙏🏽✨