In India's Khasi Hills, people are living alongside cloud forests threatened by deforestation. The Khasi are forest-dependent people who rely on the forest for food, income, shelter, medicine and more. Over recent years the forest has declined along with its potential to provide livelihood resources for these communities. Its role in carbon sequestration and the water cycle also came under threat. However, thanks to your support and our planting partner WeForest, we are working to stop this decline and restore the degraded lands into a healthy and productive forest. As the area is a global biodiversity hotspot and home to many threatened species, including the critically endangered Chinese pangolin (Manis pentadactyla), the Khasi Hills restoration efforts also have a high conservation value.
The Khasi communities themselves are at the heart of our efforts in India. Here, communities have indigenous forest conservation values and management systems, which we are supporting through WeForest's partnerships with local governments, villages and the Khasi Federation. Through assisted natural regeneration alongside sustainable livelihood development to tackle the drivers of deforestation, the project aims to halt the decline in tree cover and restore the degraded forest.
The Khasi communities themselves are at the heart of our efforts in India. Here, communities have indigenous forest conservation values and management systems, which we are supporting through WeForest's partnerships with local governments, villages and the Khasi Federation. Through assisted natural regeneration alongside sustainable livelihood development to tackle the drivers of deforestation, the project aims to halt the decline in tree cover and restore the degraded forest.
For a closer look at how local Khasi people are getting involved, meet 59-year-old Drasmina Umdor. Drasmina could grow her shop into a thriving food establishment thanks to the financing she received from the project.
She is now a successful businesswoman living independently on her earnings and is able to make a living without cutting down trees. She's also using a low-polluting stove to cook at home and intends to switch at her tea stall.
With your support, TreeSisters and WeForest is joining forces with rural families and people like Drasmina to restore forests and allow people and the planet to flourish together.
Would you like to support this project and other amazing reforestation projects around the globe?