Amongst the hundreds of diverse grassroots organizations in Mesoamerica we’ve been learning from over the past year, the vast majority face shared challenges. 

In every country and nearly every conversation, the inclusion of youth has been brought forward as one of the most pressing.

Most of the work TWP supports will need to carry on long after we are gone. 

We face multigenerational challenges that require multigenerational responses, and bringing youth into leading them is the core of their continuity. 

We’ve been honored to be a part of that continuity within the Traditional Harvest Project in Southwest Colorado. In collaboration with the Ute Mountain Ute Tribe (UMUT), Montezuma Land Conservancy (MLC), and other partners, the Traditional Harvest Project has supported Tribal members in planting and accessing culturally-significant plants and restoring riparian habitat along the Mancos River.

Twenty-eight years ago, our organization started with a focus on planting trees. 

But since our founding, we’ve seen the need to attend to a whole context – forests aren’t sustained without people, and people aren’t sustained without opportunities for work, a connection to their culture, and a voice in the decisions that affect them.

Earlier this month, in Santa Ana Pueblo, New Mexico, TWP hosted the third annual Stewards of the Southwest Summit. 

Although this event is only in its third year, we’re amazed to see the relationships that have already grown. Attendees are returning to see familiar faces and continue where conversations left off, year after year.

Fencing isn’t often the first thing to come to mind when we think about conservation.

But working from the local level continues to teach us that different places need different things. Some may need connectivity, some may need protection.

At TWP, we’ve always believed local leaders are the best equipped to address their communities’ challenges. But in many of the regions we work, women experience those challenges in distinct ways and continue to face barriers to leading their solutions.

When the 110 families of El Asintal resettled in Guatemala, they arrived home to a near-empty plot of land, with scarce resources to rebuild.

Like many Indigenous communities in the region, these families were displaced amidst Guatemala’s violent civil war. The government’s designation of lands for resettlement in the early 2000s was an opportunity to return home, but not without significant debt and great hardship.

After years of collaboration between our Indigenous Lands Program and local collaborators, we are proud to be concluding the first phase of the County Road 39 Traditional Harvest Project in Southwest Colorado. 

While we are working to continue and expand this project regionally, the first phase focused on riparian restoration and planting of native species along 3 private easements of the Mancos River.

When facing a challenge as urgent and far-reaching as climate change, it’s natural to look for seemingly efficient, single-issue solutions. At Trees, Water & People, we’ve learned that the most effective climate action is just the opposite—it grows outward, addressing environmental challenges alongside health, quality of life, and community resilience.

In 2025, more than 150 people were employed through TWP’s work. 

We know that people can only sustain their territories if they can sustain their families. And like many of our programs, our clean cookstoves program in Honduras keeps this recognition central, investing in sustained benefits for local communities, economies, and environments.

TWP has long been known for planting trees. 

But what’s most important to us is who, and how. 

In Northern New Mexico, we’re continuing to see what’s possible when these pillars remain central. Over a two-week hitch in October, an all-Indigenous crew planted nearly 6,000 trees within the Cerro Pelado burn scar of the Jemez Mountains.

Donor-advised funds (DAFs) are one of the most powerful tools for charitable giving.

There are many tax-friendly incentives to donate to organizations like TWP in 2025. Some of these incentives stem from newer tax laws, while others have been long-standing.

TWP’s Indigenous Lands Outreach Coordinator, Phillip Chavez, shares the importance of TWP’s youth engagement efforts.

Our partners throughout Mesoamerica take to heart that youth are the future of their efforts, and of their communities. 

While many of our partners focus on programs that improve food security for youth and families, they also work to integrate young people into those programs, ensuring learnings and practices are carried forward.

Marvin Lopez Torres is the Co-Manager of TWP’s Mesoamerica Program. Based in Honduras, Marvin originally joined the team as a consultant in 2020, and has since been crucial in deepening our work in his country.

For years, TWP worked in the Apeneca-Illamatepec Biosphere Reserve in El Salvador with our local partner, AAP, helping with reforestation, fire mitigation, environmental education, and food sovereignty projects.

COEAS member Carmen Rodríguez, only 40 years old, left us very suddenly on August 19. 

This loss, along with the death of Luis Hernán Baca “Mero,” has left a huge hole in the hearts of our friends and colleagues at COEAS, but it has also left one in the hearts of the entire TWP team.

When I started working with TWP a year ago, I knew it was a special organization. 

I knew we did good work, in a good way. And I knew it felt right to walk in the door every morning.

Now, after my first TWP staff retreat, I have a much better sense of why.

As federal investments in public lands and natural resources continue to be challenged, TWP is collaborating with local groups to ensure Tribal leadership remains central in land management across the Southwest.