Planting Empowerment leases land from rural communities in Panama to plant and maintain agroforestry projects. We're currently working with two smallholders in Nuevo Paraiso and the indigenous community Arimae. Each land lease partner receives lease payments, a share of the profits from revenues from wood and harvests, and educational benefits.
Juan Cruz partnered with us in 2008 to lease five hectares of land for the Adelante project. Here he and his wife speak about how the partnership has helped them.
We call the smallholders and indigenous communities we lease land from "partners", because the term indicates how we value these relationships, and the amount of trust that exists between us. Our partners enter into 25 year lease agreements with Planting Empowerment, so they must be confident that we will be good stewards of their land and honor our agreements.
Land lease contracts
Upon entering into agreements with local partners, we sign legally binding contracts that guarantee the right to carry out agroforestry on the leased part of their land. This is a more sustainable model, and as the first of its kind in Panama, has been well received by both our partners and government & businesses. Learn more about the positive social and environmental impacts this approach is creating.
Our long term social goal is to empower our Panamanian partners to cultivate and manage their own profitable, sustainable agroforestry projects.
