Plant With Purpose Officially Launches Community Designed Restoration (CDR) to Transform Lives and Land Worldwide

Plant With Purpose formally introduces CDR, a locally led model that provides a unified approach to addressing both poverty and environmental degradation.

Plant With Purpose

SAN DIEGO, CA, USA, May 24, 2024 /EINPresswire.com/ — Plant With Purpose, a Christian organization and an international leader in environmental restoration and economic development, is proud to announce the official launch of Community Designed Restoration (CDR), a groundbreaking approach to addressing the intertwined challenges of poverty and deforestation.

CDR places farmers at the heart of the transformation to foster thriving communities and ecosystems that pave the way for sustainable change. Through the application of CDR, partnering farmers have collectively planted nearly 70 million trees, empowering themselves and more than a half-million neighbors to cut their poverty in half.

“CDR is more than an environmental initiative – it’s a holistic approach that brings life and hope to communities,” said Robert Morikawa, senior director of the Plant With Purpose Innovation Lab. “We have witnessed firsthand how equipping local farmers to lead restoration efforts creates lasting change for people and the planet.”

At its core, CDR tackles the intertwined challenges of poverty and deforestation within watersheds. This model aims to restore relationships between individuals, communities, their environment and their creator through three key avenues.

Thriving People – CDR boosts the long-term well-being of rural farming families by enhancing regenerative agricultural practices and igniting community-led movements rooted in local values.

Healthy Ecosystems – By planting trees, promoting biodiversity and strengthening ecosystems, CDR revitalizes land, improves soil fertility and ensures clean water which positively impacts people and the environment.

Climate Resilience – CDR equips participants to withstand climate challenges, helping both the environment and its inhabitants remain resilient against future uncertainties.

The goal is to restore relationships among people and between themselves, others, their environment and their creator.

A Uniquely Effective Approach

CDR is applied within the context of identified watersheds. Life in a watershed is interconnected. What happens upstream impacts those downstream. From neighborhoods to markets and schools to churches, the lives of those in a watershed are all connected.

The foundation for CDR in these communities is the creation of neighborhood small groups (consisting of 10-25 people) which Plant With Purpose calls purpose groups.

Purpose groups are three things:

• A savings group that fuels financial literacy, resilience and economic opportunity.

• A farmer field school where neighbors collaboratively learn regenerative farming techniques that significantly improve crop yields, nutritional diversity and income.

• A spiritual community where faith, encouragement and mutual support create the unity and alignment that fuels individual achievement and community-wide change.

High Adoption Rates = Communitywide Benefit

The CDR model has very high participation rates. Plant With Purpose has applied CDR across 64 watersheds with a 60% average community saturation rate. When CDR is applied in a watershed, poverty is reduced across the entire community, not only among program participants. In 2023, the Plant With Purpose impact evaluation measured a 50% reduction in poverty for active participants in CDR programming and a 27% reduction in poverty rates across the whole population of the watershed.

Plant With Purpose’s CDR model represents a step forward in environmental restoration efforts, placing local communities at the forefront of change. By addressing the root causes of poverty and deforestation, CDR creates a sustainable path forward for both people and the planet.

“What sets CDR apart is its focus on community-led efforts,” said Morikawa. “Since local farmers and their families are at the center of these initiatives, we ensure that the changes are deeply rooted and sustainable.”

Plant With Purpose’s CDR model addresses these massive challenges by putting locals in the driver’s seat. Additional aspects of CDR include the participation of local governments, schools and churches. By fostering strong relationships between people and their environment and by equipping communities with the tools they need to thrive, CDR is the right approach for sustainable development today.

For more information about the Community Designed Restoration (CDR) model, see https://plantwithpurpose.org/how-we-work/. And for more information about Plant With Purpose, please visit plantwithpurpose.org.

About Plant With Purpose

Founded in 1984, Plant With Purpose is a leading Christian environmental organization, based in San Diego, California. Now operating in nine countries, Plant With Purpose spearheads initiatives for environmental restoration, poverty alleviation and spiritual renewal. The group’s holistic model focuses on community-led innovation and leadership that helps global communities reverse structural and environmental causes of rural poverty. Plant With Purpose’s integrated solutions have resulted in more than a half-million people reversing poverty, more than 60 million trees being planted, and 2.7 million acres of land being restored or protected. With local programs in Burundi, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Dominican Republic, Ethiopia, Haiti, Malawi, Mexico, Tanzania and Thailand, Plant With Purpose has a global team of more than 500 people. To learn more, visit plantwithpurpose.org.

Patrick Pierce
Plant With Purpose
[email protected]
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