Drones are the latest addition to the Yoro Biological Corridor team, and everyone in the community is excited about them!
These drones will be used to accurately map and monitor the forest canopy on IOC coffee farms. They make it easy, efficient, and fun to collect data … Once you learn how to fly them of course!
And their first task is to provide researchers with a high-level detailed vegetation maps of 40 farms.
Supplies are taking off from the city of Yoro to the small rural town of Subirana; the coffee-growing lands.
And they’re arriving at a farm that’s being turned into a field research station!
This will provide a hub for researchers and community members. A place where they can gather, share/compare data, use the internet, have a meal, and even wash their clothes, which can get easily drenched depending on how the weather swings that day, rain or heat!
Marching ahead with government support for the Yoro Biological Corridor this month.
Above: Meeting in the Central Government Office (ICF) in Yoro w/ the Honduran Forest Park & Wildlife Service … Discussing next steps with Yoro Biological Corridor.
Below: Presenting to the Mayor and Vice Mayor of Yoro Region … Building on support for Yoro Biological Corridor.
More soil collection is underway on IOC farms in the Yoro region of Honduras!
Carried out by youth conservationists, this fieldwork is critical to accurately quantifying the carbon-sequestering capabilities of the soil on Yoro Model lands.
Yoro Biological Corridor researchers are about a third of the way done taking samples now, and expect have the soil data by this fall. (The first samples were taken back in October-November of 2022).
The Yoro Biological Corridor (YBC) had representation at the global Sustainable Coffee Challenge’s “All-Partner Meeting”.
Mesoamerican Development Institute attended the two-day (March 7-8) event in Tampa, Florida.
Also in attendance were some of the largest coffee companies in the world, including Nestle, Mother Parkers Tea & Coffee, Starbucks, Keurig Dr Pepper and many more.
The overall objective of the meeting was get coffee industry leaders together, in one place, to address sustainability issues within the industry.
As this year’s coffee harvest gets plucked from the trees, Integrated Open Canopy™ test farms are busily being studied!
A defect analysis is underway here, providing quantitative data of natural pest control (i.e. ecosystem services).
This puts a scientifically proven price on how well birds combat the coffee borer beetle, so that farmers can get adequately paid for having organic pest control on their farms.
There’s more than just sustainable coffee in the Yoro Biological Corridor … These are the very first soil samples collected from Integrated Open Canopy™ (IOC) coffee farms!
These samples are arriving at a local lab, so that scientists can accurately quantify the carbon-sequestering capabilities of IOC coffee farms, (which are half coffee farm, half restored forest).
TORONTO, CANADA – Dr. Jane Goodall, Founder of the Jane Goodall Institute & UN Messenger of Peace, offers to join the Yoro Biological Corridor (YBC) Advisory Board “Comite de Gestion” in a public letter to the newly elected president of Honduras, Xiomara Castro.
With this public letter of support Dr. Jane Goodall has expressed her interest in Cafe Solar® and the Yoro Biological Corridor Initiative. The goal is to encourage the implementation of a progressive forestry law that will protect Honduran national parks and watersheds, restore forest on private lands, and integrate sustainable economic development.
Dr. Jane Goodall has direct experience in coffee and connecting forest parks in Gombe, Africa through her Jane Goodall Institute, and agreed to serve as an advisor to the Yoro Biological Corridor board on May 1, 2022.
“There is no better person to become part of the Advisory Board, and at such a key time with the first female president of Honduras making important changes for the country right now,” says Derek Zavislake from Merchants of Green Coffee and YBC co-developer.
The Yoro Biological Corridor initiative involves many partners, all of whom are ecstatic about the news: “Adding her global weight is incredibly encouraging to everyone and we are hoping to accelerate the process in enacting the corridor through Honduras’ progressive forestry law, which has yet to be used for this purpose,” says Raul Raudales from Mesoamerican Development Institute (MDI) and YBC developer.
“Forests are critical and require people for protection …” writes Dr. Jane Goodall in her letter of support, “… Honduras’ progressive forest law is a great example of leadership for the region as a whole.”
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Background:
Yoro Model: Model of producing coffee designed to restore and conserve forest on private lands (coffee farms) currently being demonstrated and refined in Yoro, Honduras. The model involves the combination of Integrated Open Canopy™ (IOC™) and the proposed scale-up Off-Grid Carbon-Neutral coffee processing in support of forest protection and restoration at a landscape level throughout the coffee regions of the Yoro Biological Corridor.
More information:
www.yorobiologicalcorridor.org
www.merchantsofgreencoffee.com
www.mesoamerican.org
Contact:
Meagan Thibeault
Communications Director, Merchants of Green Coffee
press@merchantsofgreencoffee.com
Quotes available on request from Merchants of Green Coffee, and partners listed.
Meet Ana Quinonez and Fabiola Rodriguez 👋
These two Honduran researchers are working on their doctoral degrees, studying the impacts of Integrated Open Canopy™ coffee farming on cloud forest conservation right now.
Ana is new to the Yoro Biological Corridor team this year.
And Fabiola has been conducting studies with our teams for a few years.
You can learn more about IOC™ coffee farming by listening to Fabiola’s podcast.
Yoro Biological Corridor has received National Science Foundation (NSF) recognition & support!
As part of their ‘Growing ‘Convergence Research Project’, NSF is funding a coalition that will model the impact of Cafe Solar® clean technology & forest-restoring coffee cultivation, on watersheds, forest, and people.
The $3.4 million project includes Tulane University; the University of Massachusetts, Amherst; University of North Carolina; and Indiana University of Pennsylvania.