Page 29 - 2019 Sustainability Report

NaturAmazonas: Flagship Reforestation Program Set to Exceed Projections
After successfully completing three years of
strategy development, partnership creation and
initial implementation, the NaturAmazonas project,
a collaboration between GTE and renowned environmental NGO Conservation International is accelerating its reforestation efforts and is on track
to massively increase tree production and planting. The NaturAmazonas team is hopeful that the project’s impact will exceed initial projections by up to 300%.
To support this expansion, this GTE-funded project has created four nurseries capable of growing millions of seedlings each year. The Guayuyaco Agroforestry Center in the town of Piamonte was converted and refurbished from an abandoned social site of a nearby Indigenous Inga community and is capable of growing over one million seedlings each year to support the reforestation initiative.
A new nursery, Sacha Wasi, is under construction near GTE’s Costayaco facility and will have a similar capacity when it opens in 2020.
This large-scale sustainable reforestation initiative delivers a variety of benefits:
Education about sustainable use of resources that come from the forest
Employment of hundreds of workers from the area
An emerging sustainable beekeeping and honey industry in the region
Building a wealth of botanical knowledge about the flora in the sensitive Andes-Amazon piedmont region through the collection and analysis of over 10,000 plant specimens
Distribution of efficient stoves in rural areas that will improve air quality and reduce the release of carbon
Strengthened relationships between institutions to establish a shared vision for reducing deforestation
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