Conventional conservation often portrays stewards and land managers working together to conserve, protect and/or restore critical landscapes for the survival of our planet. But underneath the macroscopic lens of conservation, women, more specifically Native American women, are rarely recognized for their achievements and dedication in the world of conservation.

The Covid-19 pandemic has exposed and exacerbated the inequalities and vulnerabilities experienced by indigenous, rural and “campesino” communities. Girls and women are the populations that have faced most of the challenges. The confinement and the economic crisis impacted the worsening violence, greater care work responsibilities and a decrease in women's income, which was already precarious and unequal before the pandemic.

After years of planting tree seedlings every spring, this year, Trees, Water & People and partners will be conducting fall plantings in New Mexico, Colorado, and South Dakota, to test whether survival rates are higher as we head into winter, versus into the hot dry months of summer.

Homemakers Dilcia Martinez, Lucia Flores and Brenda Servellon along with stove builder Avilio Garcia discuss the benefits and progression of the Justa Stove.

Maestra Fogonera - Inclusion and Women Empowerment

It is hard to imagine that 5 years ago today, Trees, Water & People faced its darkest moment in history, losing Lucas “El Lobo” Wolf, our incredibly adored colleague and friend.

Welcome Humble Bundle: An impactful investment in transformational change

It’s motivating to welcome a new corporate partner that puts their trust in our work and our approach. This year we are thrilled to have charity-focused digital retailer and publisher Humble Bundle join our community of businesses committed to giving back to people and the planet.

Help us make an impact!

We know the profound impact of travel – particularly interculturally-focused travel – on young people. It can literally change the course of their lives and careers. However, this kind of life-changing experience is usually outside the means of students from lower-income backgrounds.

On May 23rd, Executive Director Sebastian Africano and Indigenous Lands Program Director James Calabaza attended a full day workshop for grantees of the New Mexico Foundation, who awarded us a grant for our work on water resilience for Puebloan communities.

This past weekend (May 15th), the TWP Staff, TWP Board and some incredible volunteers planted 300 Ponderosa pine in Monument Gulch. The Monument Gulch/Poudre River watershed was extremely impacted by the 2020 Cameron Peak Fire.

Every fire season is an existential crisis for our friends in the Aldea de Suyapa, Honduras. Since 1987, a volunteer group of community members have organized to protect their centuries-old communal forest from firewood poachers, land grabbers, and the expanding agricultural frontier.

Window into Honduras through Field Visit: Strengthening Partnerships across Country Lines

Earlier this month, I had the great privilege of traveling with my colleagues to Honduras, the home of Trees, Water & People’s flagship clean cookstove program, and the birthplace of the Justa stove. Along our route from Tegucigalpa to Copan, we met stove builders and users, and my once abstract understanding of TWP’s work in Honduras came to life.

Winter is a quiet time of year for communities working on reforestation initiatives, including our partners at Santo Domingo Pueblo and the Oglala Sioux Tribe in South Dakota, but winter is a critical time for our nursery partners and the baby seedlings that will be planted in the coming months.

January is a time of gratitude and focus for us at Trees, Water & People. We’re bowled over daily by the generosity of our supporters, and January allows us to take stock of progress we made last year, challenges we’ll need to rise to in 2022, and the resources we’ve been entrusted to do our work.

By Laurel Thompson

Stuart Conway and Richard Fox founded Trees, Water & People (TWP) in 1998 to help reverse deforestation in Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, El Salvador and other parts of Central America. Then it occurred to them that by planting trees without addressing the reasons they were being cut down, they were only doing half the job.

In the communities of Aldea Nueva, La Ceibita, and Piedras Negras in the Department of Jalapa, Guatemala, the community gardens are managed by three incredible women’s groups. While they play a major role in the creation and maintenance of the gardens, their children are also playing an active role in learning all about their ancestral knowledge, ancient foods and health.

For Santo Domingo Pueblo elder, Joe Bird, the restoration of Tribal lands is more than regenerating critical natural resources. He believes in restoration as a form of medicine to preserve the land, language and rich traditional values that are imperative to the survival of people in Santo Domingo Pueblo.

Back in October, my colleague Valentina and I traveled to Guatemala to do some field visits in the East and Southern region of the country. It was the first time coming back to the field since the pandemic hit, and it was the first time visiting new communities in the Departments of Jalapa and Jutiapa (East).

Ignacio (Nacho) Osorto, founder of our partner organization AHDESA in Honduras, likes to say that when he met Trees, Water & People (TWP) founder Stuart Conway in 1998, his nonprofit was little more than an idea in a briefcase. An agronomist by trade, Nacho Osorto was working to restore and reforest several watersheds in rural communities outside of the capital city, Tegucigalpa.

Giving stocks and mutual funds to Trees, Water & People just got easier. You can now transfer directly from your Vanguard or Fidelity brokerage account.