Just released: Our latest Environmental Nonprofit Impact Report. Purpose on the Planet supports improved livelihoods for vulnerable communities in Madagascar and Tanzania through large-scale tree planting and long-term forest conservation programs, in order to avert the worst effects of extreme poverty today and climate change tomorrow. Since 2012, the community-based projects we support have served as a holistic platform for transforming a spiral of poverty-based decline into a virtuous cycle of positive development instead. EXPLORE MORE: https://purposeontheplanet.org ADOPT A 4-IN-1 CLIMATE ACTION PLAN: https://purposeontheplanet.org/climate-change-action-plan/ SEE HOW TO IMPACT 12 OF THE 2030 GLOBAL GOALS: https://purposeontheplanet.org/2030-global-goals-initiative/ OFFSET YOUR CARBON FOOTPRINT: https://purposeontheplanet.org/climate-positive-carbon-footprint-offset-plan/ LIVE A MORE SUSTAINABLE LIFESTYLE: https://purposeontheplanet.org/sustainable-lifestyle-low-carbon-footprint/ FIND US AT: https://www.facebook.com/purposeontheplanet https://www.instagram.com/purposeontheplanet/ https://www.linkedin.com/company/77609565/ https://www.youtube.com/@PurposeonthePlanet https://vimeo.com/purposeontheplanet https://purposeontheplanet.org/blog/
Together , We ’ re Tackling Together, We’re Tackling
10 of Today ’ s Greatest Challenges of Today’s
Velena Ponsian, Tuungane Project Forestry Program © Roshni Lodhia
Impact Report 2025 - 2026
Shopping 2 Address Climate Justice People & Planet Climate Action Theory of Change Re lieve Poverty ∙ Re store Nature Re move Carbon ∙ Re duce Emissions ReWrite Our Story
P urpose on the Planet supports improved livelihoods for vulnerable communities in Madagascar and Tanzania through large-scale tree planting and long-term forest conservation programs, in order to avert the worst effects of extreme poverty today and climate change tomorrow. Since 2012, the community-based projects we support have served as a holistic platform for transforming a spiral of poverty-based decline into a virtuous cycle of positive development instead.
Africa has one-fifth of the planet’s remaining forests but is losing them faster than anywhere else. Better protection and restoration of these forest landscapes could reduce or remove 1 billion tonnes of CO2 annually while helping hundreds of thousands of Africans earn a better living. THE NATURE CONSERVANCY
Together, every day, we’re helping to address 10 of the most significant global issues of our time: Extreme Poverty Food Insecurity Ecosystem Restoration Carbon Removal Clean Water Climate Adaptation Biodiversity Loss
Marine Health Climate Justice Sustainable Living
Click above to jump to any of these vital impact areas.
Ms Cecilia Tanu, Tuungane Project Forestry Program © John Daved
2025 in Figures
community members at project sites in Madagascar and Tanzania. ReWrite Our Story now supports improved livelihoods for over 50 77,000 This year the total number of trees planted across both locations was 225,000 trees have already been planted at project sites prior to 2025.
metric tons of CO2 during a typical maturation period. 1,800 This annual volume of planting is projected to remove more than 7,000 Community team members are planting a monthly average of trees in coastal Madagascar and around Lake Tanganyika in Tanzania.
Shopping 1 Extreme Poverty
The Re Write Our Story program is founded on a proven Recruit & Restore strategy, which has focused on large-scale tree planting and long-term forest conservation projects as the means of reviving vulnerable communities and providing work and income benefits for local villagers and indigenous people.
Both Madagascar and Tanzania fall within the world’s top 3 countries where extreme poverty has the most devastating impact. Around 50% of people in Tanzania live off less than $2.15 a day, while in Madagascar the figure may be as high as 80%. On top of helping villagers meet urgent food and healthcare needs, the household income boost from our projects provides ancillary benefits for local families, such as: improved access to schools resources to pay off debts ability to start micro-enterprises.
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2 Food Insecurity
Our mangrove restoration project helps create work and increased household income in the communities around Antsanitia in northwestern Madagascar. A reliable living wage directly impacts a family's ability to meet essential food needs. In addition, Antsanitia is a fishing village that in the past has relied on the presence of healthy mangrove and ocean systems for food and income. Crabs comprise the main catch for fishermen in this region, and crabs' habitat is dependent on mangrove forests. However, deforestation and the degradation of land have led to a steady decline in crab numbers in recent years. The good news is that our work to restore the mangroves is helping reverse this trend as well!
Lugonesi Village, Tuungane Project Forestry Program © Roshni Lodhia
On the shores of Lake Tanganyika , In addition to the direct income benefits, we're also supporting food security for families through the adoption of agroforestry — the planting of fruit- bearing trees on farms. Moshi Madigidi lives in a community close to the shore, where there is a shortage of arable land. In cases like this, we supplement the core tree planting strategy with additional planting of fruit trees close to homes. As a result, eating fruit is no longer a luxury for the community, since it’s now readily available nearby. There's even opportunity to sell any surplus and use this additional income for other pressing family necessities!
Moshi Madigidi, Tuungane Project Forestry Program © John Daved
3 Ecosystem Restoration As part of the Accelerated Restoration Collaborative , our work is informed by decades of tested and proven project experience. To restore deforested mangrove regions with the greatest speed and efficiency, the teams gather propagules from the nearby forests and plant them in the specific tidal-zone locales that best match their unique types. Here’s how the process works!
In contrast, the forestry initiative we support at The Tuungane Project , founded by The Nature Conservancy , creates income opportunities for villagers in Tanzania through seasonal work to plant ficus seedlings, longer-term work on monitoring tree health, and business training and supplies for establishing their own tree nurseries. In fact, by fostering the creation of community- owned nurseries rather than simply employing local people in a project-owned nursery, sustainability becomes an inherent aspect of the project design and participants in the forestry program are naturally empowered to become small business owners.
Tuungane Project Forestry Program © John Daved
Shopping 4 Carbon Removal
Mangroves store more carbon per unit area than any other ecosystem on Earth. They’re vital entities that capture and stockpile quantities of “blue” carbon in both the bodies of the plant and the sediment beneath them.
By focusing on the restoration of mangrove forests, we’re mobilizing one of the world’s most effective natural means of combating global warming. Compare mangrove forests to terrestrial ones: Studies show that mangroves sequester 2-5 times the CO2 equivalent of a mature tropical rain-forest. Plus, when terrestrial trees die, carbon stored in trunks and branches will be released, however, as mangroves store most of the carbon in their soil and sediment the carbon may stay put for millennia.
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Trees Planted Now Can Provide Future Income for Our Communities!
The Tuungane Project that we support in Tanzania is a collaborative of nonprofits, led by The Nature Conservancy (TNC), which takes a holistic approach to creating a sustainable future for the region. Since 2012, the Project has not only expanded protected areas to cover more than 50% of Mahale’s total forest area but even created the foundation for carbon enterprises that pay villages for protecting their forests. Today, TNC is supporting work to replicate a carbon enterprise model in Mahale that has been generating financial benefits for 8 villages in the Ntakata Mountains.
Tuungane Project Forestry Program © Roshni Lodhia
This is particularly exciting for the forestry program we support! If all the verification phases can be successfully completed, this process would enable the local people and the Tree Planting Associations of The Tuungane Project to earn a sustainable income through carbon credits earned from protecting their trees. The very same trees you are helping us to plant today!
Travel 5 Clean Water
By planting the right trees in the right places in Tanzania , we reduce the loss of topsoil that is essential for farm productivity, thus easing pressure for clearing more forest for farming. Securing soil on slopes also keeps it out of the Malagarasi river that people rely on for household water needs.
Siwema Ramadhani fetches water from Lake Tanganyika every day. In the rainy season, she walks through knee-deep water to get to the lake.
Similarly, the drilling of fresh-water wells in Madagascar is crucial for planting projects because they provide a reliable source of clean water, which is essential for irrigation and watering purposes. These same wells that support forestry and agriculture can also help to provide easier access to clean water for the local community, reducing the risk of waterborne diseases and improving overall health.
Rukoma village, Tuungane Project Forestry Program © Roshni Lodhia
6 Climate Adaptation
With climate change driving more rapid degradation of land and more intense weather events, strategic planting and restoration of landscapes is an essential tool in building climate resilience for people and biodiversity. Restoring vital coastal ecosystems in Africa will directly serve to protect these most vulnerable locations from the worst impacts of extreme weather events, such as rising seas, hurricanes and flooding. Plus, both around the fishing village of Antsanitia in Madagascar and the shores of Lake Tanganyika in Tanzania , our planting and conservation efforts are supporting the gradual restoration of once-productive fisheries that are so vital for these coastal communities.
James Francis Saint, Tuungane Project Forestry Program © Roshni Lodhia
Food 7 Biodiversity Loss
The Tuungane Project was launched by The Nature Conservancy in 2012 to conserve Lake Tanganyika, its ecosystems and affected communities.
Forests are home to more than 80% of all terrestrial species of animals, plants, and insects. Plus, the forests that we support in Madagascar and Tanzania are critical biodiversity hotspots that are home to an exceptionally diverse range of endemic and threatened plant and animal species. Specifically, deforestation in Madagascar is threatening several species of the brown lemur with extinction, and the Mahale Ecosystem is home to 90% of Tanzania‘s 2800 endangered chimpanzees. Also, Lake Tanganyika, the world’s oldest and deepest tropical lake, is a top, global freshwater conservation priority, as it teems with fish found nowhere else on earth!
Biodiversity is declining faster than any other time in human history. The number of wildlife populations around the world has shrunk by nearly 70% in the last 50 years alone!
Travel 8 Marine Health
In tropical regions such as Madagascar , mangroves anchor coastlines, and they also form a vital link between land and sea. Plus, their adaptation to highly saline waters and soils has produced astounding biological traits. For example, they can actually excrete salt or obtain oxygen through “breathing” pores! And that's not all: Mangroves shed leaves and branches that disperse and transfer essential nutrients into the marine environment, supporting intricate marine and terrestrial food webs.
Agricultural and sediment runoff can threaten the sensitive fish breeding areas, and that’s where our forestry program is so directly relevant. Planting the right trees in the right places reduces loss of topsoil that is essential for farm productivity and eases pressure for clearing more forest for farming. Keeping soil on slopes also keeps it out of rivers that support fish breeding habitat in the lake. The world’s longest lake, Tanganyika is an “inland ocean” holding nearly 20% of the world’s fresh water. It’s older and deeper than any other lake in Africa and it’s home to more than 300 fish species, including more than 250 species of endemic cichlids.
Shopping 9 Climate Justice
Tuungane Project Forestry Program © John Daved
Since 1990, the poorest 50% of the world’s population have been responsible for just 7% of total global emissions . In fact, the entire continent of Africa has accounted for less than 3% of it. However, as the map below indicates, Africa is now also most likely to endure the worst impacts of climate change.
A recent World Bank study estimates that climate change may push an additional 70 million people into extreme poverty by 2030. Whatever practical action we can take now in our daily lives to mitigate climate breakdown will also help to reduce the worst impacts of poverty for the most vulnerable populations around the globe....Yes, most of them in the countries that did the least to contribute to global warming!
10 Sustainable Living
No climate action program could be complete without a focus on how we can work to reduce emissions going forward! Why? Well, were you aware that a series of practical household measures can provide 25% of total emissions reductions needed to remain below 1.5°C! That’s why the Re Write Our Story program provides all participants with a complimentary monthly series, Sustainable Solutions, with practical insights on the power of adopting a more sustainable lifestyle.
With insights drawn from a Carbon Literacy Certification, you’ll discover how you can further influence the path to a sustainable future just through your own daily choices and habits. Topics range from the circular economy and renewable energy sources to food waste and home energy consumption. In all, the materials offer a holistic view of the latest sustainability trends and initiatives, viewed through a “practice-able” lens.
Our Three Pillars
OUR MISSION
We are committed to developing effective and economical solutions for the intertwined environmental and socioeconomic issues of our time. From our inception, we have remained loyal to 3 fundamental principles: from every single donation. 1 A 100% founder-funded model to ensure maximum impact Clearly-defined, specific, and transparent deliverables attributed to every donation. 2 We have established measurable impact objectives for all programs, which are carefully maintained and reconfirmed for every donor dollar received. Our founders cover 100% of our general operating expenses, so our donors can trust that 100% of every donation goes directly to project-location outcomes. Educational philanthropy : we help donors to create a better world by being best informed! 3 Donors receive monthly insights on how they impact the 2030 Global Goals, and how we can support a prosperous world, just by living a more sustainable lifestyle!
Tuungane Project Forestry Program © John Daved
connect@purposeontheplanet.org
1-540-324-5304
Purpose on the Planet Foundation , 320 Vine Street, Staunton, VA 24401
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