Dear Julie,
I have already submitted Inga Foundation’s Mission Statement for its Land for Life Program in Central America.
This Program is directly relevant to this present Call for Submissions.
In brief, IF is extending The Guama (Inga Tree) Model to hundreds of subsistence farming families in the Buffer Zone of the Pico Bonito National Park in Honduras. The Guama Model livelihood is comprised of four related agroforestry systems using trees of the genus Inga.
The adoption of the model by the families results in the cessation of slash-and-burn (s-b) and the soil-restoration of hillsides degraded by decades of s-b. The program is replacing whole swathes of former invasive grassland by a mosaic of agroforest.
We outline how the combination of mulch derived from Inga foliage, together with supplementry minerals (not fertilzer) has proven itself capable of the restoration of soil fertility and condition as a completely sustainable alternative to slash-and-burn. With over 450 families implementing the four agroforest systems, in effect, they and we are achieving landscape restoration. To the best of our knowledge, not one family has reverted to s-b since adopting. Once the soil has been restored and the agroforest systems become functional we are seeing a widespread restoration of habitat and of the wildlife to whom it is a condition of survival. This includes a huge diversity of birds; and even Big Cats.
I was honoured to have a full-scale paper published on the whole Program by the Royal Society Open Science platform in February 2021; and it is this that I want to include in my submission. I would be further honoured if you were to take a look at and include:
The search for a sustainable alternative to slash-and-burn agriculture in the World's rain forests: the Guama Model and its implementation | Royal Society Open Science; royalsocietypublishing.org
with kind regards
Mike Hands
Inga Foundation
M. Mike Hands