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Would you like to join us in realizing one of the longest biodiversity corridors on Earth? Become one of the First 600 to join our mission of hope and action HERE.

A big thank you to the state of Pará’s Secretary of Environment and sustainability for inviting the Black Jaguar Foundation to become part of the working group that will be responsible for building Para’s plan to restore native vegetation!  

The plan, which is part of the program “Amazônia Agora” (PEAA), aims to restore 5.4 million hectares in Pará until 2030. It will be a collaborative effort, to be delivered at this year’s UN Climate Conference (COP 28). This will further the goal of neutralising Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions by the year 2036, as outlined in the PEAA plan.

The Working Group will be responsible for holding meetings, identifying obstacles and opportunities, mapping ongoing restoration activities in the state of Pará, promoting workshops for building the state of Pará’s restoration activities, among many other activities.

Around 50 institutions are currently participating in this working group, including governmental agencies, research institutions, NGOs, indigenous peoples, quilombolas, and traditional communities. 

The Black Jaguar Foundation was present in the working group’s inauguration cerimony

On the 17th of March, part of our landraising team, led by Marcelle Grumberg, traveled to Belém to represent the BJF at the opening ceremony of the Working Group. 

Have a look some pictures of our team with Raul Protázio Romão, Pará’s Secretary of Environment and sustainability (left), and Mariana Iguatemy (right) at the event:  

We are very proud to be part of a project based on dialogue between such a diverse group of people and organizations. We hope this collaboration will contribute to the creation, integration, and promotion of projects that contribute to the ecological restoration of the Earth. Additionally, we are certain that increasing restoration efforts will also benefit the local economy by providing new jobs and income!  

Would you like to join us in realizing one of the longest biodiversity corridors on Earth? Become one of the First 600 to join our mission of hope and action HERE.

Watch the inspiring video of our long term partner De Heus visiting the Araguaia Biodiversity Corridor.It was great that their devoted team could experience all the 17 steps of the BJF-Cycle of ecological restoration that allow us to make long-term positive impact together!

The visit lasted three days, and included trips to the new BJF nursery, our restoration sites, and meeting the Araguaia Seed Collection Collective. Read more HERE for an in-depth overview of their trip.

Together with local farmers and sponsor partners including De Heus, the Black Jaguar Foundation is working to plant 1.7 billion trees to realize the Araguaia Biodiversity Corridor.

Get inspired by the video above and become one of the First 600 to join us on this story of hope HERE! 

In cooperation with Tulpen van Sam, based in The Netherlands, the BJF team spent the day delivering beautiful climate neutral tulips to some of our loyal BJF partners and friends. The event took place just in time for Easter and we hope the tulips brought even more joy to many family celebrations! Have a look at the smiling faces of some of our valued partners and sponsors in the image below:

We spent all day on the Tuesday leading up to Easter Weekend, some of us in a car and others on a bike, traveling around the Netherlands and into Belgium to visit our partners and sponsors.

With each visit we personally delivered beautiful bouquets of tulips, an Easter card, and a personalized letter with some updates from the field. We loved seeing the surprised faces of our unsuspecting friends, and are excited to continue this tradition for many years to come!

The tulips serve as a reminder that restoring the Araguaia Biodiversity Corridor is only possible with the continuous support of the BJF community. Would you like to join us on this mission of hope and action? Become one of the First 600 HERE.

Tulpen van Sam is a Dutch tulip and tulip bulb company and has partnered with the BJF to render the production of his tulips climate neutral. While delivering the tulips, we received many questions regarding their production. Thankfully, Sam Ruijter, owner of Tulpen van Sam, created a beautiful video-testimonial that explains this very well! Watch it below:

Our partner Tulpen van Sam has been working hard over the past six years to ensure that the production of their tulips is carbon neutral. Sam has built a smart tulip nursery that makes use of solar panels, heat pumps, and LED-lights to provide heat for the growth of his tulips without fossil fuels.

Besides these innovative advances, since 2020, Sam has also been planting trees with the Black Jaguar Foundation and helping us realize the Araguaia Biodiversity Corridor.

Check out Tulpen van Sam’s Website and Instagram for more information!

As the rainy season is coming to an end our 22/23 planting season is too. The past few months were full of hard work to plant as many trees as possible in 15 partner farms.

See below some wonderful footage taken from our 22/23 Planting Season sharing with you our hard work and beautiful seedlings and seeds growing into healthy ecosystems:

Our team has been working very hard to establish rural partnerships, raise funds, grow healthy seedlings, improve our logistics, expand our team and plan these stages as well as possible.

We are very proud to have a team works hard on a daily basis to ensure quality ecological restoration. In a few weeks, we will wrap up the Black Jaguar Foundation’s biggest planting season yet!

Some of the BJF team in 2022. 

LAST WEEKS OF THE 22/23 PLANTING SEASON

In the coming weeks, our field team will finalize the planting in our ecological restoration sites for this planting season.

As we move closer to the dry season, we will focus our restoration activities on flooded areas. The reason for this is that, even with lower levels of rain, these areas will still be able to use the water that has remained on the site.

At the same time, we are also carrying out maintenance in restoration sites where the planting has already been concluded.

The images below show the maintenance being carried out in the Santa Fé farm, where our team conducted direct seeding at the start of this planting season:

Have you already seen the Black Jaguar Foundation’s latest planting season video? Watch it below!

Would you like to join us in realizing one of the longest biodiversity corridors on Earth? Become one of the First 600 to join our mission of hope and action HERE.

Our Landraising team is working hard to mobilize and establish more and more partnerships with rural landowners who, like us, believe that sustainability and agricultural production can be aligned.

As a result, our number of land owner partnerships has increased significantly – a total of 17 new contracts were signed last year. This means that we now have a Community of over 20 landowner partners!

EXPANDING OUR OPERATIONS TO THE XINGUARA REGION

Last week, our landraising team participated in the very Agribusiness ESG meeting of the state of Pará, in Xinguara (Brazil). During the meeting, we had the opportunity to present our project and strengthen relationships with rural producers in the region. The event, held by Aliança Paraense pela Carne, aimed to balance corporate and environmental governance in the agricultural sector in the state.

The event’s program included a reading of the Marabá Manifesto – a document signed last year by the Alliance, which outlined the following topics, among others:

A big thank you to the rural producers that participated in the event, many of which showed great enthusiasm towards our project. A special thank you to Clécio Witeck and Daniel Cappellari, who represent the Secretary of Environment of, Mr. Roque Quagliato and family, and the Director of Instituto Fórum do Futuro, Márcio Miranda.

Our project depends largely on the engagement of rural landowners in the region. Without them, it would not be possible to realize the Araguaia Biodiversity Corridor. We are very happy to see our community grow!

Would you like to join us in realizing one of the longest biodiversity corridors on Earth? Become one of the First 600 to join our mission of hope and action HERE.

Caixa Federal Bank, one of the Black Jaguar Foundation’s loyal partners, is one of the three largest financial institutes in Latin America. Together, we will be planting 1 million trees in the coming years. During this planting season, we have already started planting seedlings and seeds with CAIXA’s support!

In 2022, CAIXA visited the BJF restoration sites and carried out extensive verification processes prior to signing our agreement in March. Have a look at some CAIXA team visiting the Araguaia Biodiversity Corridor below.

CAIXA team visiting the BJF ecological restoration sites

Ecological restoration is the main objective of our partnership, but for this to happen, a lot of preparations are needed leading up to the rainy season.

SEEDLING PRODUCTION IN OUR NURSERY

Months before the start of the rainy season, we start collecting and buying native seeds, to use in the production of seedlings or direct seeding.

To grow these seeds, we need dedicated individuals working hard on a daily basis. That’s why we have increased the number of people working in the BJF Nursery!

In our nursery, everyone is trained and qualified for the different activities including: sowing seeds, transplanting seedlings, managing irrigation, ensuring the growth and resilience of seedlings and, finally,  sending the seedlings to our restoration sites.

After going through these processes, the seedlings become Strong and healthy! Only then are they ready to be planted in our partner farms.

PLANTING IN OUR RESTORATION SITES

Our field assistants are trained in different planting activities: land preparation, use of fertilizers, building firebreaks, seeding, and taking care of seedlings, among Other activities. All of therm receive close guidence from our Field and Forest Operations Coordinators, and Restoration Analysts and Field Supervisors.

Before starting activities, our team receives theoretical and practical training in work safety. Only then are we ready to perform our duties safely and efficiently – for our BJF team and the environment.

After all these steps, it’s time to make the ecological restoration happen! Since an image says more than a thousand words, check out some images of our team working to carry out the Araguaia Biodiversity Corridor:

Incredible, right? None of this would be possible without the partnership with CAIXA Econômica Federal. We are very happy with the trust placed in our work and are hope that this will be a long term partnership in the realization of the Araguaia Biodiversity Corridor.

Would you like to join us in realizing one of the longest biodiversity corridors on Earth? Become one of the First 600 to join our mission of hope and action HERE.

Realizing the Araguaia Biodiversity Corridor requires a lot more than planting trees. Our success is a mixture of people – fundraising – landraising and restoration – all of which depend on your support. Over the years we have developed the BJF cycle of restoration, starting with the local community, followed by the science, the planting and the years (after)care. Today, we have 17 steps to safeguard our long-term impact and bring back biodiversity and healthy ecosystems.

The BJF Restoration Cycle

The 17 quality steps to bring back Healthy forests

Map displaying the Araguaia Biodiversity Corridor region.

Planting

As you can see, planting trees is only one of 17 steps of our cycle of ecological restoration! It all starts with a seed – many of which come from the Araguaia Seed Network! This seed is then germinated in the BJF’s large scale nursery, which produces over 500,000 seedlings per cycle.

In the meantime, preparing the soil, makes sure fences are temporarily built where needed to protect our small seedlings grazing on the new trees, removing invasive grasses and controlling ant populations.

Monitoring and Maintenance

To keep our forests healthy, we need your help on two fronts: maintenance and protection of our planted trees.

After the seedlings and seeds have been planted, we need to ensure an environment where they are able to grow and contribute to heathy and functioning ecosystems. In many cases, this means that we need to build fences to protect our recently germinated seedlings. We also cannot forget about the trees planted in past planting seasons! These need to be maintained, which can take up to three years.

The picture below shows one of our native trees after 2 years!

Community

Our grand project of ecological restoration can only move forward with the support of local communities on the ground. The reason for this is that we work in a unique way, we don’t buy land, but instead partner with local farmers who have an environmental deficit! The Black Jaguar Foundation’s project of restoring the Araguaia Biodiversity Corridor was initiated under the premise that if all Legal Reserves and Private Protected Areas in Brazil complied with this forest code, the ecosystem services in the Amazon Rainforest and Cerrado Savanna would be working at full speed.

It is in the benefit of landowners to comply with this law, making this a win-win-win partnership.

As a means of obtaining seeds for our project, we have also developed our very own seed collective. The Araguaia Seed Network started as a means of providing our project with quality native seeds and is already making a real difference for communities living in the Araguaia region! Last year, our field team started training sessions for communities living in settlements in the Araguaia region and have already completed the first cycle of training modules.

Another important pillar in our cycle is environmental education. With the inauguration of our large-scale nursery, many educational and engagement workshops were held by our team in the field over the past year.

Engaging the community is a core aspect of our project as we are ultimately doing this for them and depend on their support!

Research

Research is a vital step before the ecological restoration process. We must know what the original ecosystem looked like before we are able to restore it to these original conditions and make sure to plant the right native trees to bring back biodiversity to the region.

At the Black Jaguar Foundation our first task was to extensively map the whole Araguaia corridor area, looking into the prior land use, the soil composition, the existing flora and fauna and much more.

Our research is ongoing and we are constantly learning and adapting our techniques and our approach.

Below, you can see how the corridor areas changed from 1985 to 2017.

As the years go by and our 5th planting season is around the corner, we are growing more trees, and so is our team and our organisation. Together we are learning and improving, every day we go a bit further and are becoming more experienced in our work of restoration. We have learnt to work stronger together, to collaborate and work holistically with the local community and to be patient, with our work and with our trees!

DONATE YOUR TREE TODAY

As of 2022, The Black Jaguar Foundation is happy to be one of the environmental solutions showcased on the 1% for the planet platform!

1% for the Planet is a global movement inspiring business to support environmental solutions through annual memberships and everyday actions. It has already enabled us to make great connections including our very first 1% for the planet partner: Green Gear Supply! The movement was founded in 2002 by Yvon Chouinard, founder of Patagonia, and Craig Mathews, founder of Blue Ribbon Flies on the premise that: companies profit from the resources they take from the Earth and should therefore protect those resources!

Restoring the balance between nature and humankind is more important than ever before…

As noted in the 1% for the planet platform, the current level of environmental giving is only 3% of total philanthropic actions. This is far from enough to solve climate issues that need to be urgently addressed to ensure a healthy planet for our future generations.

That’s why the 1% for the planet platform incentivizes businesses and environmental projects to be “all together for the planet”. Through the 1% for the Planet platform, business and individual members can engage directly with approved Environmental Partners and offer monetary donations, volunteer time, and service donations.

Our journey with 1% for the Planet 

Becoming a 1% for the Planet partner involves a careful vetting process which helps ensure the credibility of environmental projects. The Black Jaguar Foundation is proud to be showcased on the platform, together with some other inspiring environmental projects carrying out incredible work in the areas of climate, food, land, pollution, water and wildlife. We are very happy to be a part of the 1% for the Planet community of nearly 4,000 Environmental Partners in more than 90 countries. So far, over $265 million has been certified to support approved Environmental Partners.

Soon, we hope to connect with many different organizations and individuals working towards a greener future and that many of these join us in realizing the Araguaia Biodiversity Corridor! Find out how you can become one of our 1% for the planet partners by accessing their platform here.

Who has joined us so far? 

Green Gear Supply, our first official 1% for the planet partner, aims to inspire a more sustainable and equitable world through innovative products – starting with their rain poncho. Their reusable and recyclable poncho is made from responsibly sourced materials and perfect for outdoor activities!

Find out more about Green Gear Supply by visiting their website: https://www.greengearsupply.com/

Would you like to join us in realizing one of the longest biodiversity corridors on Earth? Become one of the First 600 to join our mission of hope and action HERE.

Reforestation is a generic term for replanting trees in a specific area with various goals, including (ecological) restoration. The restoration concept relates to a more complex and essential process that “assists the recovery of an ecosystem that has been degraded, damaged or destroyed” (SER, Society for Ecological Restoration).

Ecological restoration and reforestation are terms that we use often, which can sometimes be understood to mean the same thing. In the video below, Dimitrio Schievenin (BJF Project Coordinator), explains the difference between both terms and why this is so important!

In the case of a forest, we can say that planting trees or seeds is the fundamental step to bring a degraded area closer to its original state. A newly planted forest creates the ideal conditions that both prevent invasive species from taking over and encourage a diverse set of species to flourish in a degraded area, allowing the rebirth of ecosystem dynamics and services.

Therefore, conceptually speaking, it is correct to assume that the BJF, along with its technical partners, is developing a reforestation endeavour with ecological restoration purposes along the Araguaia Biodiversity Corridor, by planting the correct mix of indigenous trees and accelerate nature’s process of regeneration. Nevertheless, it is more complex than this, so keep reading for a better understanding of both terms!

Reforestation involves bringing back any forest that has been degraded. Nevertheless, this can be done without considering species composition or the functionality of the ecosystem. We could, for instance, reforest a region using only one species of tree, and would not have to try and restore the biome to what it once was.

Ecological restoration goes beyond this – accounting for the conservation of biodiversity, species composition, and the restoration of the degraded ecosystem to its original conditions as much as possible. The goal is to bring back the fauna and flora living in the region by bringing back their ways of sustaining themselves.

Therefore, even though it is possible to carry our ecological restoration through reforestation, reforestation does not have to encompass all the steps needed for ecological restoration.

Another important aspect to consider is that ecological restoration also involves restoring non-forest ecosystems – including savannas and grasslands. At the Black Jaguar Foundation, for example, we work with the restoration of the Amazon rainforest and the Cerrado, which is known for being the savanna with the greatest biodiversity in the world.

Ecological restoration is a lot more than planting trees. To conduct it, one needs in-depth knowledge of the biome’s native tree species, to enable a favourable environment for biodiversity to return.

Seeing the natural regeneration of native species and return of animals to our restoration sites is one of the best signs that our ecological restoration efforts are working.

It shows that we are restoring the conditions needed for life to exist in harmony in their natural habitat. Watch the vídeo below where our Field Coordinator, Carlos Eduardo Oliveira, further explains this restoration technique!

To carry out our ecological restoration activities efficiently and thoroughly, we developed the BJF Restoration Cycle, which consists of 17 different steps!

Your support has been crucial in all of this. Would you like to know more about how you can support the Araguaia Biodiversity Corridor?

Donate trees HERE or join the First 600 HERE!