Reforestation in the Amazon
Investing In Mining Areas
Electronic supply chains are global and opaque. As a consequence miners are not paid a fair share and there is very little accountability and oversight where those minerals come from and under what conditions they are mined.
Little attention is being paid to how mining for our electronics is affecting the environment. Out of a lack of opportunities, as a consequence of forced labour, or simply to make a living, miners are digging for gold and other minerals in ecosystems that are already being destroyed on a large scale: tropical rainforests in South America, Africa and Asia.
The picture on the left shows an area in the Peruvian Amazon that was hit by illegal gold mining - and the devastation it causes.
This is why, next to working with Fairtrade to pay gold miners a fair share, we also partner with the PUR Projet to plant trees in an agroforestry project in the Amazon.
Investing in reforestation in an agroforestry project has two distinct benefits. The reforestation work contributes to healing an ecosystem that is being devastated by mining. At the same time, it supports the local economy by providing farmers with an additional income from FSC® – certified timber that is sustainably harvested. This way we can invest in reforestation, while also helping local farmers to earn a decent income.
Why Agroforestry?
Agroforestry is a way of farming in which trees are grown around or among crops. Coffee and Cocoa for instance can grow in the shade of rainforest trees. For farmers that has a number of benefits. By smartly integrating rainforest trees into their farming systems, they adapt their plantations to climate change, improve the quality of the soil, and achieve long-term sustainability of the production. At the same time parts of the rainforest can be reforested.
This Is Where We Plant Trees
We are investing in an agroforestry project in Peru – a country that is particularly hit by gold mining in rainforest areas. To make this possible, we are investing 5% of our sales profits of the Syllucid Charge into reforestation and agroforestry with our project partner PUR Projet. Every cable sold is a contribution to this project.
The project JUBILACIÓN SEGURA was initially pioneered with partners such as Ecosia and supports 2,663 farmers of Fairtrade and organic coffee. With the help of other partners, PUR Projet has already reforested 2,671 hectares. With the contributions from the first 10k sales of our cables, we can plant another 3,000 trees and support the generation of income for those farmers and families.