Project Type: Landscapes

Habiba Community is a bottom-up initiative based on the shores of Sinai, Egypt. It joined the Ecosystem Restoration Camps (ERC) movement in 2019 and is now one of many organisations in this movement encouraging regenerative sustainable development models in South Sinai.

Ultimately Habiba seeks to make the Sinai desert green again. Habiba’s efforts to restore the South Sinai region are matched with international efforts underway to restore the entire Peninsula, which thousands of years ago used to be a forest-covered region rich in life and biodiversity. This development model has changed the mindset, by building inclusion, creating a network of 75 farms, 48 of which are Bedouin owned, that have fair access to the local market, and providing equal opportunities for all to guarantee well-being.

Habiba combines education and work in permaculture and restoration of the natural system with the goal of cooperating with the local Bedouin community. Embracing the ERC goal of providing educational programs in environmental restoration and regenerative practices for personal health and well-being.

Habiba helped local communities to:

• Introduce regenerative agricultural techniques
• Stop erosion
• Avoid further desertification
• Rebuild local livelihoods, based on healthy ecosystems

Habiba’s key asset is a regenerative and organic farm in the desert. This adapts cutting-edge methods in sustainable agri-tech and experimentation. This farm is changing the way food is produced, and is an international knowledge hub where community collaboration takes place.

Habiba is now working towards building a climate change resilient community in the coastal town of Nuweiba.

Bioregional Weaving Lab Waterford takes a place-based approach to connecting fragmented initiatives into a collective impact approach for systemic change.

In doing this, it seeks to support long term transformation and regeneration. It aims to build a resilient food system that supports thriving landscapes, seascapes and communities. They do this by:

• Using networks and desktop research to reach out to stakeholders across the local food system. These range from farmers and teachers to decision makers in the Waterford region of Ireland. They meet them in their place, building trust, and also host multistakeholder workshops.
• Identifying the natural boundaries of the local bioregion by looking at maps of soil, watersheds and biotypes, walking the land and talking with the people.
• Sensing the need for systems change and applying tools and methodology for designing a strategy to push for holistic (natural, social, financial and inspirational) regeneration in rural and urban settings within the bioregion.

The bioregional weaving lab in Ireland started in 2019 and is hosted at the Grow It Yourself (GIY) office at GROW HQ cafe and regenerative garden in Waterford. GIY is a social enterprise that was established in 2008 to increase food empathy through school, community, business and media programmes. They have supported around 1 million participants to grow at least part of their own food.

The Irish bioregional weaving lab is part of an emerging European collective coordinated by Commonland, Ashoka and The Presencing Institute.

theOtherDada (tOD) was founded in 2010 as a regenerative consultancy & architecture practice with a special focus on Biomimicry in Beirut, Lebanon.

Its founder, Adib Dada, spent seven years advocating for the renaturalization of Beirut’s river which today is nothing but a toxic sewage canal. Frustrated by the lack of progress and carelessness of local authorities, tOD decided three years ago that what was needed was tangible action on the ground. The company evolved beyond architecture to reclaim cities as habitat for all life to thrive.

The project has survived through a revolution, pandemic, destruction of the organisation’s office during the Beirut explosion, near-fatal injury of its founder, and resignation of the entire previous team due to external societal pressures to emigrate.

tOD is a symbol of how working with and for nature enables adaptation, resilience and hope in the most challenging times, especially as it just became Lebanon’s first BCorp, proving that whatever the context, businesses can and should be a force for good.

The pilot project ‘Beirut’s RiverLESS Forest’ empowered people to reclaim an urban landfill on “river” banks. This received overwhelming support from Beirut’s citizens and beyond.

Local community members volunteering have said: “Planting a tree here feels like an act of revolution itself.” It connects people back to themselves, their land, each other – and life itself.

theOtherDada is now maintaining 11 forests, 10 of which are reclaiming degraded land in public spaces (traffic islands, school playgrounds, public parks), plus one private one. This amounts to 3 267sqm, 28 different native species and over 13 000 trees and shrubs.

NILE Journeys was established in 2016 as a platform for Nile communities. Its work unfolds through community hubs across Nile Basin countries. There are currently eight hubs, and they are expanding.

Communities across the Nile Basin suffer inequalities and limitations in their natural, human, or technological well-being, which renders them vulnerable to climate change and its effects. The word NILE refers not only to the Nile’s energetic field of the majestic river but also serves as an acronym for what the platform aims to do “Nurturing Impulses for Living Ecosystems”.

The NILE Journeys vision is to nurture life-affirming actions in the Nile bio-region through participatory and experiential learning spaces rooted in indigenous knowledge and regenerative practices.

NILE Journeys has so far:

• Engaged more than 97,000 people
• Provided direct support to eight Community Hubs
• Established three dialogue spaces
• Established three agroecology demonstration sites
• Set up a library
• Co-established a restaurant in a rural co-working space
• Co-established a moringa oil press unit
• Sponsored the education of 83 children
• Sustainably regenerated 168 hectares
• Trained 35 community leaders on dialogue facilitation

The NILE journeys’ goal for 2026 is to become a model of trans-local collaboration in the Nile basin with regenerative practices that can be replicated in other fields and other parts of the basin.

The Jupago Kreká Collective was born in 2005 after the indigenous Xukuru people reconquered their traditional territory. The colonisation process had destabilised the Xukuru way of life, jeopardising the viability of their agricultural systems, practices and knowledge. The collective took on the challenge of regenerating both the environment and the mind based on the principles of Lymolaygo Toype (Living Well) with the commitment to break away from the system of land exploitation left by the colonisation process.

Jupago Kreká aim to coordinate processes that enable the identification of sustainable experiences among indigenous families, the systematisation of these practices and the socialisation of the results.

Jupago’s main achievements to date are:

• A community agreement to defend and regenerate 360 hectares from the Boa Vista Sacred Complex.
• Planting over 5,000 trees every year, combined with environment regeneration actions using the principle of cosmo-nucleation founded on harmony among all beings visible or not. As a result, multiple springs returned to life, producing new creeks and even waterfalls never seen in the area by this generation.
• Materialised the Jeti Radyah lab to prepare traditional medicines using local species, with free distribution to the community. It also opened a local solidarity store where the community can share with visitors the enchantment from medicines and local handicrafts.
• Xukuru believe that humans are nature, therefore, the healing of nature is necessary for human healing. Jupago seeks the enchantment of life, which is achieved by actions which care for all the lives that surround them, taking care of nature for the Sacred Nature.

Tuq’tuquilal was born in 2019 as a dream created by the founder and a local family, located in Lanquín, a warm subtropical rainforest territory guarded by the Q’eqchi Mayan people of Guatemala.

This dream was co-created to form a holistic project that works to regenerate the land through artisanal production of cacao and other products, organic agriculture, and ecotourism.

For Tuq’tuquilal, to regenerate is to repair the social, economic, and natural fabric we are immersed in locally, while facilitating opportunities for conscious cultural interchange and co-education. It focuses on repairing and innovating around:

• The economy and health of the cocoa producing families, by offering the possibility of selling their cocoa at an increasingly fair price, integrated with educational processes.
• The concept of identity and value that families have of their cocoa and culture through educational, organizational and identity processes.
• Ways of inhabiting a space, proposing ways of life that transform the ecological footprint of those who inhabit the space in Tuq’tuquilal.
• Agricultural alternatives based on permaculture applied to cocoa production plots and other productive systems.
• Forms of artisanal production with the objective of not polluting, creating efficient processes, celebrating cultural ingenuity, and generating employment for families.
• Social and economic fabric, seeking markets that integrate the valorization of family and field work, and fair and conscious trade in their work philosophy

The Mulokot Foundation, based in Suriname in South America, is a Wayana Indigenous led organisation.

Suriname has been home to the Wayana people for hundreds of years. There are only 865 Wayana Indigenous living in Suriname, worldwide there are just 2500 Wayana Indigenous left, and they see themselves as guardians of the forest. A formerly nomadic people, the Wayana only recently settled in three main villages in Suriname: Kawemhakan, Apetina and Palumeu. The Wayana territory in Suriname counts around 24 thousand square kilometeres and is one of the regions with the highest biodiversity in the world and has many endemic species, with new species still being discovered.

The foundation is working toward transitioning away from slash and burn farming methods of agriculture towards more sustainable options which will allow the lands to restore and regenerate.

In order to end the use of slash and burn farming (which involves destroying forest), the Mulokot Foundation will provide training and tools to local Wayana to support the use of composting to revive existing plots.

A thriving agricultural programme will also reduce the need to fly vegetables and food into the territory, currently necessary due its remoteness. It will also provide an alternative to fishing, which is needed due to the poisoning of rivers by gold mining in the region.

Ashiniawka – Asociación de Mujeres Sapara (Sapara Women’s Association) is an association of indigenous Sapara women in Ecuador. It has been working to defend the Amazon, and the rights of indigenous peoples and women, for more than ten years.

Today only 500 Sapara live in a territory of more than 360,350 hectares and only three people guard the language. The Sapara people conserve a highly diverse natural heritage and their lands form a natural border with the territories of the Indigenous Peoples in Isolation.

The association also ensures the well-being of communities and respect for women’s rights. The lack of participation of women in political spaces and the advancement of the extractive industry were two of the main reasons why Ashiniawka was founded.

Ashiniawka and its founding partners, especially its president Gloria Ushigua, are an international example of what it means to be guardians of the Amazon forest, stopping the advance of oil companies and promoting alternative initiatives to extractivism.

They also work on a practical level using agroecology and permaculture techniques to restore degraded land.

The organisation has also established itself as a safe haven for women to report cases of domestic violence and sexual abuse. Ashiniawka helps women and children experiencing domestic violence find medical help and take legal action.

Tribes and Natures Defenders Inc was founded in 2007 and is based in the Philippines. The organisation is comprised of local indigenous people and embeds the teaching of the elders.

It works to protect existing rainforest, restore the degraded mountains in the tribal communities, preserve ancient wisdom and empower young people to become the next eco-warriors for the future generations.

It works towards community, spiritual, cultural, economic and environmental regeneration, drawing on elder knowledge to fully grasp the essence of the holistic approach in protecting humanity and nature.

The organisation’s projects exist to benefit the tribal members as well as the wider ecosystem and has focused on:

• Food security
• Wildlife protection
• Peace and nature connectivity training
• Preservation of ancient cultures.

It also prioritises economic aspects of tribal communities because it believes that the economic development of communities is key to stopping the destruction of the mother earth, and preventing the arrival of capitalist mining and logging.

Since 2013, Reviveolution has worked in deep partnership indigenous wisdom keepers to bridge ancestral wisdom in the modern world. It has worked in partnership with the Q’ero Nation and Quechua communities in Peru for 10 years and the Drikung Kagyu lineage of Tibet for the last two years.

Reviveolution is committed to supporting locally run initiatives led by and owned by indigenous wisdom-keepers who spread traditional knowledge through cultural and ecological initiatives. In 2017, it sponsored the purchase of a family-sized farm in the Huarán watershed of the Sacred Valley of Peru. This land has flourished into a botanical sanctuary named “Hampi Mama”, which means Medicine Mother in Quechua. This sanctuary is run by Quechua medicine women and serves as a promising beacon for ecological, social and economic regeneration.

Hampi Mama acts as an eco-cultural hub where locals and international visitors learn about indigenous herbal plants, practice land regeneration methodologies, and receive traditional healthcare services. We organize retreats, intercultural ceremonies, and courses to expand traditional ecological knowledge in the Sacred Valley and to nurture deep partnerships between indigenous wisdom-keepers who lead land based projects abroad.

Hampi Mama Sanctuary stands on four pillars:

• A model farm where it practices and shares ecological stewardship practices through farmer-to-farmer training
• Capacity building through female leadership
• Community healthcare that incorporates indigenous medicine
• Bridging of networks to build a broader transformation based on ancestral principles