ACRE is Vana’s nature-based solutions platform.

Nature-based solutions are underfunded and need to scale

Climate change and biodiversity decline is an existential risk. Our nature-based model targets unsustainable rural models of development, climate change, and land degradation. Simultaneously, nature-based solutions that benefit both people and nature face a USD 273 billion annual funding gap.

  • In the past two decades, 87% of tree cover loss in Southeast Asia was from commodity-driven deforestation. Rural livelihoods must be addressed as a long-term solution.

  • Warming exacerbates extreme events and stresses water and soils. This has led to a net decrease in natural carbon sequestration capacities.

  • Uncontrolled deforestation leaves behind hostile landscapes that inhibit growth and threaten biodiversity.

Mainland Asia’s largest forest is rapidly degrading

Myanmar used to be covered in thick tropical forests, but from the 1990s poor governance, civil war and corruption led to massive deforestation.

Forest coverage shrunk from 70% to 43% of the land mass, representing a loss of 7,445,000 ha which is now largely degraded soils.

Successive Myanmar governments have attempted to solve this problem by pushing teak plantations, but these monoculture enterprises led to:

  • Depleted soils;

  • Vulnerability to pests and disease;

  • Lower quality timber; and

  • Biodiversity loss.

About the pilot

 

Why Myanmar?

Myanmar is a least-developed country experiencing economic collapse, with The World Bank has predicted an 18% contraction in its economy. Rural livelihoods and nature, often hit the hardest, must be protected.

Our project is based around the village of Myinmethi. Populated by an agrarian Taung Yoe population of approximately 1800, the village sought help to reforest their communal land after hearing about Philippe Lenain’s reforestation efforts in a neighbouring village.

Demographics and society

ACRE aims to restore an area devastated by deforestation and ecological decline, while benefiting communities.

Uncontrolled logging for timber, charcoal, and firewood, likely in the mid-1970s have left soils exposed and vulnerable.

Through time, wind and rain have eroded the topsoil, washed away nutrients, and evapotranspiration has plunged water tables from 30-40 feet to over 250 feet below ground.

ACRE aims to restore this land and benefit local communities with official partners RECOFTC and The Nature Conservancy via a succession forestry approach.

  • Hardy pioneer trees are planted with high density, fixing nutrients to degraded soil and providing shade for native species to follow.

  • Once shade is formed, native species are planted interspersed, forming natural forest layers for a holistic ecosystem recovery.

  • Pioneers are felled incrementally, creating room for native species, and are sold with attention to carbon permanence.

  • Return of a restored forest to the community, with on-the-ground fire and poaching protection, ensuring permanence and lasting benefits.

ACRE’s approach