summer 2008 newsletter

Honeybees are fascinating

insects and one of the most spec-

tacular social animals in the

world. Honey, wax, royal jelly

and propolis are all valuable by-

products of the honey bee, whose

main function, pollination of

fruits and vegetables, has an incal-

culable value to humanity..

Honey is valued everywhere. It

contains carbohydrates, proteins,

water, essential oils, vitamins and

minerals. It sweetens food and is

used in cultural ceremonies.

Eating honey or using it as an

ointment is part of many tradition-

al ceremonies such as birth, mar-

riage, and funeral. In Ethiopia,

honey wine is brewed especially

for weddings. In Masai communities of East Africa,

honey is used to pay dowry.

For centuries, honey has been used as a medicine, typ-

ically as a treatment of ulcers, burns and wounds.

Studies suggest that the use of natural honey has the

potential to reduce 7% of total cholesterol level and 6%

of total blood sugar.

Honey can be collected from wild sources, or from

managed bee colonies foraging in forests or among

cultivated plants. The exploitation of honey, if done

properly, does not harm the environment. It can foster

both farm productivity and biodiversity conservation,

as sustainable honey production requires good land

management, plenty of bee forage, and an absence of

toxic chemicals. Tree crops can be well integrated into

an apicultural system, providing economic and envi-

ronmental benefits to the participating communities

Honeybees & the World Food Supply

Honeybees are the most important agricultural crop

pollinator in the world. Bees’ food resources-nectar,

pollen and honeydew- have little direct economic use

for humans. However, bees pollinate plants and trees

that constitute about 25% of the human diet. In North

America alone, honey bees pollinate over 90 different

agricultural crops.

The relative importance of pollination service varies

from crop to crop. Some crops, such as sunflowers,

clover, beans, almonds, and melons are completely

dependent on bees. Crops such as cowpea, sesame,

peaches, soybeans, and orange, although not complete-

Johnny Ipil-Seed News Vol. XVI, No. 2

The quarterly newsletter of Trees for the FutureSummer 2008 Vol. XVI, No. 2

Bees for the Future

continued page 4

The recent SCAA

Conference in Minneapolis

was in may ways a conver-

gence of agricultural leaders

from many parts of the

Developing World where

coffee is an important

export.

The country being honored

this year is Ethiopia, the

home of coffee and where,

with our partner, Greener

Ethiopia, we presently have some 6,200,000 seedlings

waiting for the rainy season to be transplanted.

Hundreds of Ethiopian Americans attended the event

and were re-united with their friends from back home.

So it wasn’t surprising when they started something

that has become known as the “Minneapolis

Doctrine”, which begins: Ethiopia says NO!!!

It wasn’t long until exhibitors and delegates from

Kenya, from Burundi, from other nations, joined in:

We also say NO!!! NO to what? Quite a few things as

a matter of fact.

NO to the international gangsterism masquerading as

“globalization” – and to all the ways it has found to

bring grief to the poverty-stricken peoples of these

developing nations:

NO to international price-rigging of food and farm

supplies

NO to the hoarding of food that makes this possible.

NO to poisoning our lands with chemical fertilizers

and pesticides.

NO to corporate land-grabbing and –

NO to the political and corporate greed that makes it

possible

NO to starving children begging in the streets

And NO to a lot of other actions that have driven peo-

ple to the plight they find themselves in today. For

example, NO to the so-called international “develop-

ment programs” and the local officials that welcome

the extra money these impractical and costly projects

bring with them, which become loans in inflated dol-

lars that must be repaid even when the projects prove

disastrous.

And NO also to the greedy officials who look the

other way when these giant corporations, attempting to

grab land for “plantations”, strip away the natural

resources on which local resi-


Johnny Ipil-Seed News is a quarterly newsletter of TREES

FOR THE FUTURE, Inc., a nonprofit organization dedicated to

helping people of the world’s poorest communities to begin

environmentally beneficial, self-help projects.

This newsletter is printed using wind energy on recycled paper

with soy-based ink and is sent to all supporting members to

inform them of recent events, plans, financial matters and how

their support is helping people.

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Dr. John R. Moore - Chairman, Dr. Peter Falk - Vice Chairman,

Mr. Oscar V. Gruspe - Finance Officer, Dave Deppner -

President, Mr. Bedru Sultan, Ms. Marilou Herman, Mr. Franz

Stuppard - Members, R. Grace Deppner - Recording Secretary

(non-voting)

ADVISORY COUNCIL

Mr. Franz N. Stuppard - Advisor on Haiti, Dr. Mizani Kristos -

West African Development, Dr. James Brewbaker - University

of Hawaii, Mr. William Campbell - Seasoned Energy, Mr. Steve

McCrea - Global Climate Change, FL, Dr. Malcolm Novins -

George Mason University, Dr. Noel Vietmeyer - The Vetiver

Institute, Mr. Sean Griffin - Forestry & GIS Specialist, Mr. John

Leary - Advisor on Senegal

STAFF

Dave Deppner - Founder, Executive Director

R. Grace Deppner - Founder, Associate Director

Maryann Manuel - Membership Services

Gorav Seth - Ruppe Center Coordinator

Josh Bogart - Central America Coordinator

Ethan Budianski - West Africa Coordinator

Jeff Follett - South America Coordinator

Francis Deppner - Southeast Asia Coordinator

David Tye - East Africa Coordinator

Brandy Lellou - Grants Program Coordinator

Tebabu Assefa - Media/Education Coordinator

Jennifer Carter - TREE PALS Coordinator

Gabe Buttram - Business Partner Coordinator

FIELD TECHNICIANS

Jean Bosco - Burundi, Louis Nkembi - Cameroon, Dr. Yigezu

Shimeles - Ethiopia, Dr. Pascal Woldomariam - Ethiopia,

Guillermo Valle - Honduras, Subramanian Periyasamy - India,

Sagapala Gangisetty - India, Donal Perez - Nicaragua, Gabby

Mondragon - Philippines, Danny Zabala - Philippines, Theresa

Cahilig - Philippines, Omar Ndao - Senegal

To receive this newsletter or for more information, contact:

TREES FOR THE FUTURE

The Loret Miller Ruppe Center

for Sustainable Development

P.O. Box 7027

Silver Spring, MD 20907

Toll Free: 1-800-643-0001

Ph: 301-565-0630

[email protected]

WWW.PLANT-TREES.ORG

Opinion:Defiance!

dents depend for their very lives.

The “Minnesota Doctrine” has a long and, we think

justifiable list of the grievances of the world’s rural

poor. Heading the list of their needs is something that,

for most of them, was long taken for granted: FOOD

SECURITY. Over the years, for most communities,

this was not a major concern. Well, it is now. And when

the food is gone, or people think it’s gone, we now

have riots in the streets.

It should be no surprise that the global situation has

come to this. The real question is: why have we, in the

more affluent world, not joined our voices with theirs?

Are we truly that much better off? Is our own future

that secure? Are we a part of the solution – or are we

part of the problem?

It was, after all, our dollars that made possible a pro-

gram of supposed “energy independence” whereby

giant corporations, despite excellent advice against the

idea, detailing the possible “unintended conse-

quences”, decided to take a food staple – corn – and

turn it into something we can burn in our cars. And the

price of bread and milk has since doubled here at

home while people throughout Central America con-

tend with the cost of their main foodstuff –again corn

– which has also more than doubled.

And it might be added that, in producing these

bumper crops of corn, we have done serious damage to

our own lands and water resources. The nitrogen and

phosphorous running off corn fields here in Maryland

is quickly poisoning the Chesapeake Bay.

It’s our own energy industry that discourages the

development of safe and sustainable alternative

sources of energy. It wasn’t so long ago that we trem-

bled at the thought of $100-a-barrel oil. Now our gov-

ernment is stockpiling it at $125 a barrel. With the

energy czars earning $40 billion+ per year while

accepting billions more in government grants for main-

taining the status quo, should we not wonder if they

really are trying to find and develop sustainable alter-

natives” Do they really have our best interests at heart?

To all of this, your TREES program recognizes the

reality taking place in the streets and in the fields of the

Developing World. We know that restoring FOOD and

WATER SECURITY, and developing ENERGY

SECURITY are vital to the welfare of every person on

this planet. We believe that it is not only possible but

that, in fact, the simple but practical technology is

being rapidly developed and that acceptance is grow-

ing even faster. Our own sort of defiance is the devel-

opment of more acceptable,

more holistic, approaches to restoring trees and stabil-

ity to the world’s degraded lands.

A good bit of the technology employed comes from

looking backward over the centuries when there was a

far closer relationship between people and the forests

that surrounded them. For example chemical fertiliz-

ers, which so many consider indispensable to agricul-

ture today, have not been around all that long – fortu-

nately, we believe. Before that, crops grew well in a

system now called “organic”. Our FOREST GARDEN

program is, of necessity, organic – because the partici-

pants have no access, and little money, to do otherwise

even if they wanted to. Still, year by year, their crops

increase as we all get smarter - together.

The same may well be true of energy: can it be grown

on trees? Would this then be a strong incentive for peo-

ple to bring back sustainably-managed forests to the

world’s degraded and abandoned lands? Not so many

years ago, small towns across our Midwest had “gas

houses”. When Lincoln entertained, the White House

was lit by gas derived from wood. The technology has

since been greatly improved.

Is this “22nd Century thinking”? No, we’re finding

ourselves way behind the curve on new technologies

already being developed. In fact, we have now brought

on a new technician to help TREES catch up. As

TREES concentrates more and more on environmental

education in the villages we serve, we’re getting offers

to provide us with many new technical breakthroughs:

bicycles that generate electricity, and balloons tethered

1000 feet above these rural communities, each generat-

ing enough electricity to light a small village. We hope

soon for electrically-powered motorbikes to make our

field representatives far more mobile. We’re integrat-

ing energy-producing plants into our projects – and

finding ways to make charcoal of exportable quality as

a sustainable, environmentally beneficial, energy com-

modity.

We certainly hope, and believe, this is a world far dif-

ferent from what the children of these rural villages

will grow up in – and that they should have a good look

at it, and start thinking about it, now. We greatly appre-

ciate the support you are providing to this program. We

need your ideas as well – while there is still time.


ly dependent on the bee, have substantially increased

yields when pollinated by bees. The monetary value of

these pollination service amounts to $14 billion in the

United States alone.

Unfortunately, deforestation, the

use of genetically modified crops

and insecticides, herbicides, and

pesticides have reduced honeybee

populations worldwide. Poor land

management further reduces their

habitat. The collapse of honeybee

colonies here in North America and

in Europe must be of great concern

to everybody involved in agricul-

ture – and to the rest of us as well.

While a number of possible reasons

have been mentioned, we find it

noteworthy that this is taking place

in parts of the world where chemical farm products –

pesticides and fertilizers – have been heavily applied

for many years while in parts of the world where these

products have been unavailable to the great majority of

farmers, the bee populations continue to thrive.

The bee population loss has reached a critical stage.

This phenomenon, whose cause has not been fully iso-

lated, is termed "Colony Collapse Disorder" (CCD). If

urgent action is not taken, CCD has the potential to

cause $15 billion in direct crop losses and $75 billion

in indirect losses, illustrating it’s impact on internation-

al agricultural markets. For example, the price of

honey increased by 30% compared to last year on the

US market. Some countries, like Turkey, have turned

from a honey exporting country into a honey importing

country. Even China, the leading honey export country,

reduced its exports to fulfill its domestic needs.

In general, the loss of the honeybee population under-

scores the critical link that bees play in bringing crops,

fruits, and vegetables to market. With such high lev-

els of loss of honey bees due to habitat destruction, dis-

ease, pests and other factors, it is not only a bee crisis

but more importantly a pollination crisis that severely

hurts agri-business and world food supply.

Honey bees and sustainable agriculture

Trees for the Future recognizes the importance of bee

pollination in meeting various community needs. In

our Agroforestry Training Manual, which was devel-

oped to empower communities in developing coun-

tries, we recommend that communities include trees

for bee forage as part of windbreaks, forest gardens

and alley cropping practices. One tree can provide as

much nectar and pollen as hun-

dreds of smaller plants. The greater

the habitat diversity, the higher the

benefit attained.

These techniques help increase the

diversity and abundance of crop

pollinators, and will help crop pro-

duction, in addition to direct eco-

nomic benefits. They also provide

habitat for wildlife and other bene-

ficial insects, such as predators and

parasites of pests. Integrating

honey production with agroforestry

projects by growing multipurpose

bee forage trees on farmers’ lands ensures a sustainable

supply of nectar and pollen. This not only provides

habitat and food for honeybees, but also diversifies

farmers’ income. Some of the trees we are planting that

provide good bee forage include Leucaena, Calliandra,

Grevillea, and Tree lucerne

Incorporating sound agroforestry practices also helps

crop pollination by helping reduce winds, making it

easier for pollinators to fly and visit flowers. Less wind

creates slightly elevated temperatures around plant-

ings, which increases the time that pollinators can be

active. Over all, our tree planting program through

agroforestry is benefiting communities in developing

countries and helping sustain the bee population.

Support for Beekeeping in Ethiopia

Due to the importance of beekeeping to sustainable

development, we are developing small-scale beekeep-

ing enterprises in local communities. In Ethiopia, we

have started beekeeping projects with our partners

Harmony Farms and the Oromia Coffee Cooperative in

Ethiopia to supplement our tree planting program.

Ethiopia is considered a potential giant for honey pro-

duction in Africa due to its diverse habitat and flora.

Bees are almost always present in the wild. Equipment

can be made from materials at hand, which creates

great opportunities for people who have no access to

financial capital.

Currently honey production and commercialization in


Bees for the Future (cont’d from page 1)

The collapse of honeybee colonies here in

North America and inEurope must be of

great concern to every-body involved in agri-culture – and to therest of us as well.

Ethiopia is mainly based on traditional methods, using hives

made from logs, bark and clay, which are hung on trees to attract

swarms of local bees. Production and commercialization from

these traditional hives is low. The use of modern box hives could

yield more than twice as much honey. We are actively involved in

planting many varieties of bee forage, and in supplying modern

hives. We have planted more than one-half million flowering

plants and distributed hundreds of hives. Harmony has 1000

hives and is increasing this to 25,000, and Oromia will soon have

100,000 hives.

Beekeeping also supports many different sectors within society

including village and urban traders, carpenters, tailors, and those

who make and sell tools and containers. However, the added

value is not fully exploited mainly due to low price and limited

marketing channels. In order to have better access to markets and

get better prices for honey, a constant supply of quality product is

needed. Currently, this is one of the major bottlenecks to creating

a better market in Ethiopia.

High quality standards and regular supplies can only be met

through improved production harvesting techniques, post harvest

handling, storage and processing. In this regard, our local part-

ners are building capacity in Ethiopia to overcome such prob-

lems. We are reaching out to as many communities as possible to help families make a responsible living by

launching small-scale beekeeping enterprises.

Editor’s Note: We are pleased to introduce Mohamed Chilalo (pictured on theright) who has been working hard as an intern doing research here. He bringstwo points of view, one from his homeland in Ethiopia and the other from histechnical education and research experience. Mohamed has considerableexperience in beekeeping, both using traditional (log) hives and more mod-ern systems and so we are most happy he took on this assignment.


Traditional Beehive in Ethiopia

Bees for the Future (cont’d from page 4)

Modern wooden hives, which are

being distributed by our partner

Harmony Farms, on a hillside near

our training center in Qatbare.

This design costs less because it is

made entirely from local materials,

and it has a significantly increased

yield over polyurethane hives.

This April Joshua Bogart, TREES Central AmericaProgram Coordinator, spent 5 days in Nicaragua visit-ing project sites and providing technical support withDonal Perez, our in-country field representative. Theymet with many communities and organizations that areinterested and motivated to implement reforestationand agroforestry programs. Here isan excerpt from his report, whichaddresses local agroforestry practicesin the region.

On the 24th we visited the commu-

nity of Arenal, visiting the sites were

Donal is working on starting nurs-

eries. We went to the schools where

Donal has been giving workshops,

where we used the time to talk about

the type of agriculture that is prac-

ticed in the zone and talk to them

about how to fit more trees into their

production methods. Donal explained

that they were unable to start nurseries early because

they only get water in these communities 12 hours

once every 8 days.

The people in this region already are practicing a vari-

ety of agroforestry. Donal has a very intimate knowl-

edge of this system, as he grew up in this area.The sys-

tem of “gardening” that we saw was very similar to the

idea of a forest garden, with a high layer of coconut,

an understory of avocado, papaya, tamarind, etc, then

vegetables and flowers. It would be interesting to doc-

ument this and maybe experiment to give more uses to

this system. The main crop is Pitia (Dragon fruit,

Hylocereus spp.) but also grow Jocotes (hog plums,

Spondias purpurea), Tamarind (Tamarindus indica),

Avacado (Persea americana), coconut, pineapple, and

mammon (Melicoccus bijugatus). Along with these

Fruit species, the residents of the area also encourage

several timber and forage species such as Albizzia sp,

Enterolobium cyclocarpum, and

Brosimum sp. People also grow basic

grains and vegetables. This indige-

nous use of agroforestry gives us con-

siderable opportunity in the region

both as an opening in that the people

are already open to cultivating trees

which is often a hard first step, and to

document how the trees are used as

reference in other project areas.

People in the zone demonstrated a

lot of interest in the theme of refor-

estation, and how selected species

can fit into the production system of

the area. We are finding that there is work in various

areas, from education work in the schools to planting

of windbreaks in the north of the country. With the rel-

atively widespread use of agroforestry systems, there

is a lot of potential for empowering people to get more

uses from what they already have. For example I saw

a lot of Neem and Moringa, and from the conversa-

tions that I had it seems that these are some of the

species which are being underutilized.

Nicaragua, one of the poorest countries in Central

America, is at major risk for severe environmental

degradation. Our work has never been more necessary.


The system of “gar-

dening” that we saw

was very similar to the

idea of a forest garden,

with a high layer of

coconut, an understo-

ry of avocado, papaya,

tamarind, etc, then

vegetables and flowers.

An alley of Jocote (Spondias purpurea) (left)

Nursery site for passiflora quadrangularis (right)

Indigenous Agroforestry Practices in Nicaragua

The Annual Conference of the SCAA (Specialty

Coffee Association of America) was held this year in

Minneapolis in early May. This year the Coffee

Industry honored Ethiopia where coffee was first dis-

covered some 3,000 years ago and which today

remains a major exporter of highly prized coffee beans.

Trees for the Future, Greener Ethiopia, Ethiopia

Airlines, and Andarge Asfaw traveled to Minneapolis,

Minnesota to explain ways that tree planting can bene-

fit coffee growing communities around the world while

also improving the quality of coffee in people’s cups.

The SCAA has become much more concerned in

recent years about the issue of sustainability. One rea-

son is that consumers today are much better informed

about how good coffee is produced, and they see the

relationship between coffee, which was always a forest

plant until very recently, and shade trees which bring

nutrients back to the soil and flavor to the cup.

This relationship has grown more important in recent

times as concern grows about climate change and the

public understands that a combination of coffee and

other crops, grown in the shade of deep-rooted legumi-

nous trees will remove a great amount of carbon from

the atmosphere every year.

Jason Long, President of the Sustainability

Committee of SCAA, has been a good friend of

TREES over the years. Not long ago, we planted

some 85,000 trees in the mountains above Lake

Yojoa in Honduras, which annually remove more

carbon dioxide than is emitted from the opera-

tions of Jason’s company, Café Imports.

Jason called TREES late last year and asked if

we were interested in planting enough trees to

offset the total emissions caused by this year’s

Conference and, if so, would we make a “carbon

calculation” to determine how many trees that

would be so the SCAA could provide a grant to

plant those trees. We did the arithmetic and deter-

mined that it would require planting 350,000

trees – at a cost of $35,000.00. The trees would

be planted in Tanzania, where much of the coffee

is grown, which is also very close to the Gombe

Stream National Park, which is a refuge for

Chimpanzees. In this way, the trees could per-

form an additional service by protecting the park.

Jason provided us with a booth at the

Convention, which we worked into two booths

and shared with our partners,

Greener Ethiopia and Ethiopian Airlines. Because

many Ethiopian-Americans attended the convention,

and because the coffee companies wanted to learn

more about the program, we stayed plenty busy. We all

were impressed with how excited people from the cof-

fee industry – growers, roasters, importers, and retail-

ers – are about sustainable production. Our team con-

sisted of Tebabu Assefa, Bedru Sultan, Dave Deppner,

Nate Dreyfus, Jennifer Carter, Winta Teferi, Jeff

Follett, Alex Muzo of Ethiopian Airlines and Andarge

Asfaw, a famed photographer from here in Silver

Spring. All through the three day convention, people

crowded into our booths.

We met with growers from several countries who

asked if we could help them develop shade-grown cof-

fee programs. Most important, we established a new

partnership with Tedessa Mekena, President of the

Oromia Coffee Group, which is three cooperatives

joined together to form an organization of some

340,000 family-members. With them, we will develop

programs that produce a wide range of fruit, vegeta-

bles, and honey in addition to coffee – all to be grown

in a Forest Garden concept.

Specialty Coffee Association of America Conference 2008


Dave Deppner and Tedessa Mekena of the Oromia Coffee

Group exchanging information and ideas for the coming

year

At the request of companies concerned about how to

reduce their “carbon footprint”, we often calculate

their emissions and how many trees need to be planted

to “offset” those emissions so that a company (or

maybe a family) can become “green.”

We did this for the SCAA Coffee Convention held this

year in Minnesota. We calculated air travel, automobile

travel (including taxis), we included hotel rooms for

7,500 people and heating/ cooling that monster of a

Convention Center. It required planting a lot of trees –

about 350,000 of them - to offset the projected 8,800

tons of carbon dioxide the event would produce.

What did surprise us was that way over half of the

emissions were caused by airplane travel. Travel by

automobiles/taxis was a distant second. Emissions gen-

erated from the convention center and 7,500 hotel

rooms were a comparatively minor part of the problem.

Air travel, now including charges for snack lunches

and for stowing luggage, is costing all of us a lot more

than we once thought it did. We’re sure you’ll be

pleased to know that there is one major airline, an

African airline, that sees the concern and is working to

make a difference. It’s Ethiopian Airlines.

Late last year, Ethiopian Airlines learned of our pro-

gram in the Guraghe Zone. They decided to join as a

partner with TREES and our other friends, Greener

Ethiopia and, now our newest partner, the Oromia

Coffee Group. Since then they have provided free air

travel for our technicians heading to various assign-

ments throughout Africa. Their help has made it possi-

ble to plant an additional 300,000 trees and more in

Ethiopia and elsewhere in Africa.

This support gained the airline a great amount of

respect, recognition, and new business, not only in

Ethiopia but in the many countries they serve.

Encouraged by this, they are now planning to take an

active role in the tree planting programs already start-

ed. Presently they are the host airline for the Sullivan

Foundation conference on the environment, which is

now meeting in Arusha, Tanzania. There are some 250

delegates and TREES will be represented by Ethan

Budiansky who has been coordinating our Africa pro-

grams.

Now Ethiopian Airlines has announced that from

now on, they will plant one tree for every passenger

they carry. They are also informing passengers that

they can also be a part of the pro-

gram by voluntarily adding a small

amount that will be used to plant

even more trees.

The idea has been well received.

Ethiopian Airlines calculates that

they will be planting more than

2,500,000 trees per year, plus what

their passengers are adding. That

means that within a year these trees

will be taking some 60,000 tons of

carbon dioxide out of the air and that

will grow by the number of passen-

gers they carry, year after year.

Within just a few years, EA will be

flying green – zero carbon emis-

sions. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if all

the airlines thought like that?


Ethiopian Airlines: Flying Green

Caption:The DC-3, which in World War II was often called the “Gooney Bird” was the first passenger

plane in Africa in the late 1930’s. As soon as the new, fuel efficient, Boing 787’s are ready to fly, this will

be the ship Ethiopian Airlines flies to carry people between Africa, Europe and North America.

David Tye is our new East Africa Regional Program

Coordinator. He will be based in Tanzania to help facil-

itate projects and establish contacts throughout the

region. David is originally from Scottsdale, Arizona,

and studied Environmental Biology at Northern

Arizona University.

David served in the Peace Corps as an Environment

Volunteer in Tanzania from 2001-2003, where he

focused on agriculture, agroforestry, and natural

resources management. His time in Tanzania as a vol-

unteer helped him to understand the importance of

incorporating financial incentives into any conserva-

tion program.

Following his time in Peace Corps, David moved to

Washington, DC and worked as a program associate

for a small international development company, where

he learned project backstopping and the office side of

implementing international development projects. He

also started studying International Development at

American University focusing on rural development

and agroforestry.

In 2007, David traveled to Kenya and Tanzania to con-

duct research on why small-holder farmers generally

do not adopt agroforestry techniques for his Masters

Thesis. Last summer, he also worked with the Tanzanian Department of Forestry and learned how local govern-

ment officials implement development projects in Tanzania.

David is excited to work with Trees for the Future because of their commitment to working with local commu-

nities to improve the lives of rural farmers in countries throughout the world.

This July, David Tye will be heading to Moshi,

Tanzania to establish the Trees for the Future East

Africa Regional Office. By establishing a permanent

regional office, we will be able to provide stronger in

country technical support, and we will be able to work

more closely with our partners in Kenya, Tanzania,

Uganda, and Ethiopia.

David will be working with local non-profit organiza-

tions, communities, and concerned farmers to imple-

ment agroforestry and natural resource management

projects over a large swath of Eastern Africa. Moshi is

well situated for this purpose, as as it is located about

halfway between Nairobi and Dar es Salaam on the

Tanzanian-Kenyan Highway, and is only 30 minutes

by minibus from Kilimanjaro International Airport.

Over the next year, we will be working closely with

our partners to establish tree nurseries and to provide

training seminars in agroforestry. During this work,

we will identify local coordinators who will assist

David in implementing these projects. Within eight

months, we hope to identify one country coordinator

for each country in the region. Coordinator will han-

dle much of the project implementation and training.

At our East Africa Regional Office, we will also be

establishing a training center that can be used to con-

duct training sessions. We will be developing a one-

acre forest garden next to the Regional Office, which

will be used as a demonstration plot for interested

farmers.

The strong regional presence afforded by this office

will enable us to work closely with the local and coun-

try coordinators to expand the East Africa Program,

helping more families to plant millions more trees.

TREES Opening East Africa Regional Office


Introducing David Tye

David in front of an Albizia schimperana he

planted while serving in Peace Corps

Weather throughout South and Southeast

Asia so far this year has been especially

hard on the people of both the lowlands and

the mountains. Whether this is due to

Climate Change or not, dry seasons are not

as dry and nobody seems quite sure just

when the planting season should begin.

People in the Irrawaddi delta of

Myanmar, once called Burma, have suf-

fered greatly from a massive cyclone that

destroyed rice crops, food and water sup-

plies, and left more than 1,500,000 people

destitute. The population has little shelter,

nothing to eat, and only muddy water to

drink, even though many thousands of tons

of relief goods stand only a short distance

away off shore, unable to move because of

government prohibitions.

A series of major typhoons has hit the

Philippines, starting in February. Rice

crops there have been pounded into the

mud by the heavy rains and flooding. In the

uplands, mostly unprotected by tree cover,

landslides are taking a big toll on human

life. And this is only May! The hurricane

and typhoon season does not even start until

next month!

The weather has been especially hard on our seed pro-

duction trees in the Philippines.. We now have seed

trees of very high quality of five different species but

heavy rains destroyed more than half of our early seed

crop and winds broke off the branches of many trees in

the lowlands – some of ours have not much left except

a shattered trunk about four feet high. Still, by this time

next year these will have grown back into real trees,

producing seeds again – that’s the kinds of hearty trees

your program is growing.

Despite the hard times, or perhaps because of them,

more groups than ever before are joining the program.

For instance, the day I’m writing this we got a call

from a well known Filipino inventor, Alfonso Puyat,

who has land in the mountain city of Baguio, much of

which is on slopes of 50 degrees or more. He sees the

deforestation there – and what heavy rains can do on

these unprotected slopes. He offers his large area of

land there as a demonstration of how the planting of

deep-rooted, leguminous trees can prevent these land-

slides. We’re supplying him

with seeds of about nine species that look promising

and he promises regular reports of how effective they

are.

Another request came from Joel Lee and the Lee

Family, who have started the Cebu Permaculture

Initiative in Cebu City where again, most of the sur-

rounding hills have been completely denuded. The

Forest Garden idea especially appeals to them as this

allows people in the project an assured supply of

healthy food at the same time it protects the city – and

the city’s water supply. The Lee Family offer their

place in the city as headquarters for our program in the

southern Philippines and an area of 40 hectares (100

acres) to be developed as a very big Forest Garden –

big enough to produce the food and energy needs of at

least a dozen families.

We were surprised to hear from a friend from long

ago, Elmer Sayer on the north coast of the big island –

Mindanao – whose organization is still working hard

and is now busy attempting to reforest a 700 hectare

site with about 1,200,000 trees.

Philippines Update:Stormy Weather

Trees Field Reps Danny Zabala and Phil Casupanan

standing on a mountainside that is being reforested


Stormy Weather (cont’d from p 10)

That’s how your program can grow when you have

good people like Elmer involved.

Our main program remains in Zambales Province

north of Manila and along the South China Sea. We

now have a team of three people on the job and they

are developing partnerships with 22 towns of the

Province.

Even there, our seed trees along the coast have most-

ly been shattered this winter season but the local

groups have been able to harvest well over a million

seeds. We found that the trees growing inland are in far

better shape and that local leaders were busy harvest-

ing – and immediately planting – the seeds.

The local organizations look to establish a training

center to teach people about the Forest Garden idea,

while also distributing seeds and training materials -

one that is easily accessible to all 22 towns of the

Province. The mayor of Botolan town, Roger Yap, has

long been a good friend to the project. He is offering us

use of a center high in the mountains where most of the

trees are being transplanted and is also looking for a

site where this permanent center can be established.

Meanwhile, the Antique project has acquired two

sites for demonstration of the Forest Garden. At one

site our local partner, the Marilou Cares Foundation,

has even built a bahay kubo (a small house made of

bamboo and nipa palm leaves) which will be the pro-

gram office there. Both will become seedling nurs-

eries, distributing seeds and seedlings to communities

throughout that province. As more groups join in, the

Philippine program will be able to plant more than two

million trees in 2009.


Amor Deloso, Governor of Zambales, & Dave

Deppner discussing sustainable charcoal

Dave and Grace Deppner showing off our 4 year old leucaena seed production trees


India - Expanding to the North

Our work in India has been growing rapidly over the past year as more people are finding out about our pro-

gram and how it can help improve their livelihoods while protecting the environment. Thanks to this, we now

have more people, better seeds, and more trees being planted than ever before.

In 2007, we brought on Sagapala Gangisetty as our second field representative, which has expanded our work

into Andhra Pradesh, a cotton producing region where farmers are being hit hard by prolonged droughts and sky-

rocketing prices for agrochemicals. Gangisetty and his Green Tree Foundation are showing these communities

that alternatives exist that protect the environment while providing for the community.

Subramanian Periswamy, 300 km to the south in Tiruvannamalai, is working on a project to reforest Mount

Arunachala, a sacred pilgrimage spot that is visited by millions of pilgrims annually. He is also training and col-

laborating with many other NGOs and community leaders in the region, leading to new projects and new

alliances.

Thanks to Subramanian, Gangisetty, and all of our other partners in the area, not only will we be planting hun-

dreds of thousands of trees, but our agroforestry training manual has been translated into the local languages of

Telugu and Tamil, which are spoken by over 150 million speakers. This is helping us to reach new people and

start new projects.

Trees technician Gorav Seth will be travelling to India in August to provide in-country technical assistance and

support. We will have a detailed update on the progress for you this fall.

Our field representative Subrmanian Periswamy

with Mount Aruanchala in the background

Two year old trees (top), and monkeys playing in

a large ficus tree (bottom)


Gabe Buttram recently joined out team as our

Business Partnership Coordinator. He became interest-

ed in conservation and development while completing

an undergraduate degree in Construction Management

at Northern Arizona University where, through his

research and work with Habitat for Humanity, he con-

centrated on energy and cost efficient construction

methods. He also volunteered with local conservation

groups to protect the natural lands where he enjoyed

spending his free time.

Throughout the second half of his undergraduate edu-

cation, Gabe became set on the idea of working in a

developing country to share his knowledge and experi-

ences with others who might be able to use them. Soon

after finishing school, Peace Corps provided him with

the chance to do just that. For two years, Gabe served

as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Lesotho, Africa. While

there he spent much of his time working with a small

development and conservation project in the rural

highlands where he lived. The goals set by this project,

implemented by CARE Lesotho-South Africa, were to

improve livelihoods through the promotion of agro-

forestry and sustainable agriculture, tree nursery devel-

opment, and small business development. This, as is so

often the case, was an incredible and life-changing

experience for Gabe. He realized during Peace Corps

that livelihood security and conservation in the devel-

oping world was something he wanted to spend his life

working towards.

After Peace Corps, Gabe attended a Dual Master’s

Degree Program in Natural Resources and Sustainable

Development. Through this program, he was able to

spend two semesters studying international affairs and

global environmental policy at American University,

and another two semesters studying more pragmatic

elements of natural resource management at the UN

University for Peace in Costa Rica. He also had the

opportunity to work with a forestry conservation

organization, researching and studying the effects of

market mechanisms to control deforestation and miti-

gate climate change.

Gabe has recently graduated from this program and is

now very happy to be on board with Trees for the

Future. He feels this is a wonderful place to continue

working toward the improvement of livelihoods and

the protection of our environment.

Introducing Gabriel Buttram, Business Partnership Coordinator

In January, we brought Jeff on board to start a new

regional program in South America. Having served as

a Peace Corps volunteer in Suriname, Jeff is familiar

with the region. Over the past 4 months, Jeff has been

working with all of our contacts in the region to devel-

op a strong program and to introduce TREES to more

organizations in the region. Jeff will be spending 3

weeks in June in Brazil, meeting with leaders of 7

local organizations, and will be providing technical

support to farmers in the northeast of the country, a

region that is suffering from irregular and declining

rainfall.

He will be working with our local partner, Fernanda

Peixoto. They have already translated our agro-

forestry training manual into Portugese, and are going

to be conducting training sessions and workshops dur-

ing this trip.

Jeff has also been working with other countries in

South America, including Bolivia, Venezuela, and

Columbia.

Off to Brazil

This Febuary,, Jennifer Carter, a long-time friend of

Trees for the Future, approached us with an idea to

help empower local schoolchildren to respond to the

daunting concerns of climate change by participating

in proactive experiences in their local environment. It

seemed to us an ideal time to reactivate TREE PALS, a

program we launched in the

90’s that links schools

around the world in environ-

mental activities so that stu-

dents may share in corre-

spondence.

Jennifer approached

TREES because she knew

that we recognize the need

for youth participation in

response to global climate

change. After watching a

documentary on current

environmental events, her

16 year old son was begin-

ning to wonder what his life

would be like in what

seemed a world filled with

disaster. Acting on impulse,

she wrote down the idea of

planting seeds as a way to

dispel fear and inspire stu-

dents to nurture their envi-

ronment and drove to the Trees for the Future office the

following day.

In March, she began by researching current trends in

environmental education and consulted with local

teachers to create a comprehensive list full of multi-

disciplinary activities that would hopefully initiate

enthusiasm among corresponding students.

By April we were ready to go to Ethiopia to launch

our pilot program with schools that had expressed an

interest in TREE PALS. Working with a range of part-

ner schools from urban Addis Ababa to the rural areas

of the Guraghe Region (about 3 hours south) provided

the program with a wide range of student experiences.

Like all Trees for the Future projects, TREE PALS is

community-driven and was taking shape according to

the the interests and concerns of the students, teachers,

and parents involved. At the Future Talent Academy in

Addis Ababa, I invited each child to plant seeds to

establish the first TREE PALS

tree nursery. Overnight, a stewardship program was

organized by elementary students, kindergarten chil-

dren were bringing trash to their teachers, and high

school classes requested to stage a debate on carbon

offsets. There was so much activity that the school

placed the TREE PALS program on their website as a

permanent part of their cur-

ricula! By May, the

saplings, thanks to the care-

ful attention of young envi-

ronmentalists, had grown to

over 30 cm in height, and

they will soon be out-plant-

ed to benefit the local com-

munity.

These students, and the

two thousand others

Jennifer encountered on this

amazing trip to Ethiopia

became “TREE PALS” as

they sat responding to let-

ters written to them by chil-

dren in Washington DC and

suburban Maryland.

In June, Jennifer will trav-

el to Central America where

TREE PALS will incorpo-

rate the Forest Garden into

school plantings and,

together with teachers and parents, add a nutritional

component to the program. It is hoped that the Forest

Garden, a diverse planting of leguminous trees, fruit

trees, and vegetables, will serve to demonstrate the

impact the Forest Garden can have on overall health

and educational achievement.

By the end of this year the TREE PALS program will

have launched a dialog between thousands of students

from East Africa and Central America with students in

North America based on shared experiences in their

local environment. TREE PALS makes it clear that

each tree planted and each flower watered has a posi-

tive impact on the health of their new TREE PAL.

Get involved! Become a member of the growing

TREE PALS community! Email TREE PALS

Coordinator Jennifer Carter at [email protected]

for information on school participation and sponsor-

ships.

Bethlehem, a student at the Future Talent

Academy in Addis Ababa, with a tree seedling


TREE PALS! Bringing Kids Together For Trees

Quotes from Tree Pals Participants

Dear Students of Miss Jennifer,

Hi! My name is Yeraeifirae Sileshi. I am going to tell you about my main point.It is

about planting trees. It is like this. The first day Miss Jennifer got to our class and

told us about what are we going to do and what you guys have done. The next week I

joined her project and started planting trees. We taught the lower grades how to plant

and take care of the plants.

My another point is asking you some questions.What have you done about the "Green

School"? Do you just plant trees or do you take care of them after the planting?Is

your school green? If you guys were Earth what will you say to children? Answer me

your questions by your next mail.

Thank you, Yeraeifirae


Dear Students of Grade 6 in West Brook School,

Hi...You know the Global Warming is ging to

occur in our planet Earth. You know that Miss

Jennifer came to our school and gave us seeds to

plant. We planted almost all seeds in our school

and we took some seeds and plant seeds in our

house. We saw your pictures. Miss Jennifer took

our pictures. You may see them. We have to clean

our environment and plant seedlings. So I guess

you did marvelous things to protect our mother

land Earth too.

Thank you! Hemen

Greetings from Ethiopia,

I'm Barcot.

You've probably heard of Global

Warming. I just wanted to know what

your school is doing to save the Earth!

In our school, we planted seeds and help

take care of them.

Peace-out, Barcot

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Loret Miller Ruppe Center

P.O. Box 7027

Silver Spring, Maryland 20907

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Trees for the Future is part of the Aid to AfricaFederation Our Combined Federal Campaign

Number is 10715

More Things About Forest Gardens

Every month, Trees for the Future sends out an e-

newsletter. Sign-up by going under “Join the

Mailing List” on www.plant-trees.org and entering

your email address.

E-Newsletter

Congress is at last taking up the issue of climate change

with a strategy known as “Cap and Trade” which might

possibly cut back American carbon emissions, but does

nothing to reduce the nearly 400 parts per million of

carbon already in the atmosphere.

At the same time the desperately poor of many devel-

oping nations are already rioting in the streets, or are

close to it, because there is no food – none they can

afford anyway. Meanwhile food, and the fertilizer to

make food grow, are stacked in locked warehouses.

Around the world, the price of food has increased over

70% in the past two years.

Growing crops and trees is the only practical way to

take carbon out of the atmosphere. Growing them

together, the idea of the Forest Garden, means more

food, better food, plus clean water, sustainably pro-

duced on less land and without the need for costly and

dangerous chemical inputs.

And taking far more carbon from the air at a much

lower cost per ton. Thanks to your help, these Forest

Gardens are being started now in several countries.

Early results are most encouraging. We’ll keep you

informed.

p. 1 Bees for the Future

p. 2 Opinion - Defiance!

p. 6 Agroforestry in Nicaragua

p. 7 SCAA Conference

p. 8 Ethiopian Airlines - Flying Green

p. 9 Introducing David Tye

p. 9 TREES East Africa Regional Office

p.10 Philippines - Stormy Weather

p.12 India -Expanding to the North

p.13 Introducing Gabriel Buttram

p.14 Tree Pals - Bringing Kids Together

summer 2008 newsletter

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