This was the confident declaration from the United Nations upon announcing seven new initiatives named UN World Restoration Flagships — a prestigious designation awarded to the best examples of ongoing, large-scale and long-term ecosystem restoration in the world.

We were absolutely thrilled (though not at all surprised) to learn one of our long-standing partners is among them — congratulations to our friends at Trees for the Future (TREES) for this outstanding achievement!

TREES’ initiative, ‘African Farmers Transforming Food Systems,’ is being recognized for bringing their Forest Garden Approach — an innovative regenerative agroforestry technique — to multiple countries across Africa.

The Forest Garden is a multi-tiered agroforestry system of trees, shrubs, and crops smallholder farmers grow on their land — replacing unsustainable farming practices with a solution that restores nature and fights soil degradation, biodiversity loss and climate change.

TREES is working directly with thousands of local farmers and their families, providing training and equipment to design and implement Forest Gardens. Land is protected and improved, yields are maximized, and farmers get steady income — all while more carbon is sequestered in the soil and newly-planted trees.

This is what large-scale, economically and socially just ecosystem restoration looks like: 229,000 hectares to be restored (with over 41,000 already restored), and 230,000 green jobs created by 2030.

At Catona, we’re proud to be a part of it. We funded a thriving Forest Garden project in Homa Bay, Kenya — designed and managed in close collaboration with TREES. We’ve seen first-hand the incredible difference this project is making to the lives of local farmers and their families, and how it’s regenerating nature and restoring local ecosystems and biodiversity.

The Kenyan project alone is expected to sequester approximately 4,000,000 tonnes of C02 in the soil and in 87 million newly-planted trees. Our partnership with TREES allows us to fight the drivers of land degradation, food insecurity, and climate change — all at once.