Strengthening Communities and Protecting Forests Amidst a Global Crisis
2020 Annual Report
Decades of Institutional Strengthening, Realized
Roberto Rojas, President of La Federacion de Comunidades Nativas del Distrito de Iparia, addresses the community of San Jose de Pacache
The year 2020 crystallized the importance of our mission: not only as a forest protection organization, but also as a human rights organization. From the moment COVID-19 hit Latin America, Rainforest Foundation US (RFUS) mobilized to implement short- and long-term interventions to address the changing needs of the most vulnerable communities. We leveraged existing relationships and tools, while also seeking new collaborations and investments from governments, foundations, other non-profits, and on-the-ground partners.
We have long favored a partnership model that strengthens indigenous peoples’ governance systems at all levels. We saw how effective this was amidst delayed response times for information and relief from the state. Early on in the pandemic, we worked with indigenous partners to disperse information about the virus; provide medicines, protective equipment and food; and campaign for funds and supplies. We also provided financial and technical support for communities looking to establish new income generating activities.
The year 2020 tested—and proved—decades of investment in relationship building. Even as international travel ground to a halt, our regional partners were activated, coordinated and effective at protecting their communities and their lands. We saw how critical our efforts are to strengthening local communities and regional institutions—work made possible thanks to the commitment of supporters like you.
Our Mission
The mission of Rainforest Foundation US is to support indigenous and traditional peoples of the world’s rainforests in their efforts to protect the environment, and to fulfill their rights by assisting them in:
Securing and controlling the natural resources necessary for their long term well-being and managing these resources in ways which do not harm their environment, violate their culture, or compromise their future; and
Developing the means to protect their individual and collective rights and to obtain, shape, and control basic services from the state.
A Message From Our Executive Director
A few short weeks before the COVID-19 pandemic ground the world to a halt, I spent time in Buen Jardin de Callaru in the Peruvian Amazon. This village stopped deforestation in its tracks in just one year by using our Rainforest Alert method of combining satellite-based territorial monitoring with foot patrols. They are a model for thousands of communities across the Amazon.
During my visit, I saw the people of Buen Jardin come together to restore what had been destroyed by illegal loggers and coca growers. Dozens of villagers planted hundreds of seedlings. The pandemic hit shortly after their reforestation efforts began and scores of villagers died. But despite devastating losses and economic hardship, people continued to check on their seedlings. Even when faced with the most difficult odds, the work is continuing and new initiatives are taking root. Our indigenous partners are as resilient as the forests they care for.
I saw the same resilience in our RFUS team who went above and beyond to get resources to the indigenous communities who needed them. They adapted to different ways of working, faced new professional stressors, and juggled challenging circumstances in their personal lives. I’d like to thank them for their unwavering commitment to our mission.
In these pages, you will read stories of hope, resilience, and strength. You will learn about the people behind the work—our team members, our partners, and our supporters. We would not be able to help communities protect their rights, forests, and livelihoods without them, and without you. We are deeply grateful to each and every one of you.
Sincerely,
Suzanne Pelletier Executive Director Rainforest Foundation US
COVID-19 Relief
Helping our partners meet the demands of a global pandemic
Indigenous communities have been especially vulnerable to COVID-19. The virus has wreaked havoc on rural communities, where people already suffer from chronic health conditions that go untreated due to a lack of money and a lack of medical infrastructure. This, combined with indigenous peoples’ communal lifestyles, has resulted in outbreaks that have been pervasive and difficult to contain. Indigenous elders—key to a community’s social fabric and holders of vast knowledge about rainforest land and life—are especially at risk.
Since early 2020, we have been working around the clock to support our partners in providing communities with assistance. We’re proud of the indigenous organizations we partner with in Peru, Brazil, Guyana, and Panama, who have quickly adapted to the unique demands that the global pandemic created.
Supplies of food, medicines and fuel purchased thanks to RFUS’s COVID-19 fundraisers arrive on the shores of this Ticuna community in the Peruvian Amazon.
For communities without internet or smartphones, being able to identify COVID-19 symptoms, knowing how to curb its spread, and receiving information about the vaccine is vital. At the beginning of the pandemic, we collaborated with our partners in Central and South America to design and distribute print and digital materials for COVID-19 prevention in their communities and in their languages. Additionally, we helped coordinate the distribution of emergency food staples, medicine, and personal protective equipment. As quarantine halted global trade and travel, we developed sustainable revenue-generating activities for these villages, such as reforestation with trees whose fruit sells at a high profit margin on the market. We also produced a star-studded livestream benefit, SOS Rainforest LIVE, which raised over $300,000 for indigenous communities across the world’s tropical belt.
Unprecedented times call for an unprecedented response, which is why we co-sponsored the Amazon Emergency Fund (AEF), a groundbreaking partnership with more than 30 non-governmental and indigenous organizations, represented by the Coordination of Indigenous Organizations of the Amazon Basin (COICA). Together, along with your generous support, we raised nearly $3 million dollars in emergency grants for over 150 indigenous communities across nine Amazon countries and territories. These funds provided food and medical supplies, urgent prevention and care, emergency communications and evacuation, protection and security for forest guardians, food sovereignty, and community resilience.
Additionally, we leveraged our network of hundreds of remote forest patrollers (sometimes referred to as “community monitors”) who, under normal circumstances, detect and stop illegal deforestation. These individuals adapted their skills and tools to capture critical health information in communities so that data managers in the regional indigenous peoples’ organization could keep state agencies abreast of new outbreaks.
RFUS is an organization that cares deeply about the health of communities who all too often don’t receive the government support they need. Throughout this past year—and for years to come—we are proud to be their partner.
Rainforest Foundation US got my attention because of its holistic approach to protecting rainforests by supporting indigenous communities.
Meet Our Development Operations Manager
Viviana Briseño Márquez has a personal commitment to our mission
2020 has been a busy year for Viviana Briseño Márquez. After joining RFUS six years ago, working initially as an intern before moving her way into administration and fundraising, she recently transitioned into her current position as Development Operations Manager. In this role, she spearheads RFUS’s fundraising procedures and ensures it is as effective and efficient as possible.
Born and raised in Mexico, Viviana was encouraged from a young age to support those who protect the culture and rights of her country’s indigenous peoples. This, in addition to her early interest in nature and conservation, led her to RFUS.
“Rainforest Foundation US got my attention because of its holistic approach to protecting rainforests by supporting indigenous communities,” she says. “At that time, there were few organizations that combined environmental protection with human rights.”
Over the years, Viviana has witnessed how committed every team member is to the organization’s mission, and the profound trust that exists between RFUS, our partners, and other organizations. This was especially apparent, she says, in the swift way RFUS reacted to the pandemic, utilizing the relationships the organization had built over decades to support its partners in new ways, while still prioritizing the well-being of its people.
As she moves into her second year as Development Operations Manager, Viviana is excited to see the different programs RFUS has been testing in the last few years scaled up and expanded, so that more communities can benefit. And she always looks forward to what she considers one of the most rewarding parts of her job—getting notes from donors describing why RFUS matters to them. Whether it’s drawings from children or letters from adults, “they always cheer me up and remind me why I love what I do.”
Community-Based Territorial Monitoring
Using technology to protect rainforests and fight climate change
Plinio Pizango Hualinga, Policy Analyst for RFUS in Peru, explains forest monitoring smartphone technology to villagers in Yahuma I Zona.
Community-based territorial monitoring is at the heart of our work with our partners. By the end of 2020, RFUS and the Indigenous Peoples’ Organization of the Eastern Amazon (ORPIO) trained more than 100 indigenous forest patrollers—also called “community monitors”—in Rainforest Alert, a satellite-based territorial monitoring system that alerts them when their forests are being destroyed. Combining satellite imagery on smartphones with on-the-ground investigations, forest patrollers verify evidence to equip community leaders with the information they need to take action.
Despite the lockdowns imposed nationwide during the emergency, illegal invasions into indigenous peoples’ territories spiked in 2020 as environmental enforcement agents were redirected to support the national health emergency. Our forest patrollers were needed more than ever before.
While travel to many areas within South and Central America was restricted due to COVID-19, our partners in these areas expanded patrols of illegal activity in their territories, keeping deforestation at bay. By the end of the year, we assisted indigenous peoples in protecting more than 23,000 square miles (more than 6 million hectares) of territories in four countries—Peru, Guyana, Brazil, and Panama.
The forest patrol program is predicated on extensive scientific research, which shows that indigenous peoples are the most effective stewards of the rainforest, and that the continued health of those rainforests is crucial in the fight against climate change.
They believe in us; they consider that, as indigenous peoples, we are the protagonists of forest protection.
Working Together to Empower Indigenous Communities
Jorge Pérez Rubio leads the indigenous peoples of Loreto, Peru, to protect the forests
For over 30 years, Jorge Pérez Rubio has defended the Amazonian indigenous peoples of Peru. A Huitoto indigenous leader from Putumayo, Loreto, he has worked hand-in-hand with RFUS as President of the Organization of Indigenous Peoples of the East (ORPIO) since 2017. To empower indigenous communities to protect forests, ORPIO and RFUS partnered to co-design the technology-based indigenous forest patrolling program, Rainforest Alert.
In 2020, Pérez’s work with RFUS included training indigenous peoples in the satellite-based territorial monitoring system, accompanying the community patrol when they were concerned for their safety, signing complaints about environmental crimes in indigenous peoples’ territories, and, during the pandemic, coordinating and managing the delivery of supplies to those most affected by COVID-19.
“For me and the indigenous movement, RFUS’s mission in Loreto is very important, since they want to protect the forests by including us in the process,” says Pérez. “They believe in us; they consider that, as indigenous peoples, we are the protagonists of forest protection.”
In Pérez’s experience, RFUS is the only organization delegating power and proffering valuable skills directly to regional indigenous-led organizations. In so doing, RFUS ensures that indigenous partners are better able to overcome the common challenges afflicting their communities. Additionally, the training RFUS provides strengthens the communities’ ability to monitor their territories and enables them to share what they’ve learned with others elsewhere. Pérez was particularly proud to see one indigenous Kichwa patroller travel to Indonesia to demonstrate the Rainforest Alert method.
When asked what he values most about RFUS, Pérez cites “Its great work, responsibility, and respect for indigenous peoples.” In the next year, he hopes RFUS can continue to train more and more indigenous forest patrollers in Loreto, particularly indigenous women.
Land Rights
A historic win for land rights in a challenging year
King Reynaldo Santana of the Naso Tjër Di people of Panama addresses one of many of his community’s advocacy planning meetings leading up to the successful ruling in December that reaffirmed his peoples’ legal rights to land and autonomy.
For more than 50 years, the Naso Tjër Di people of Panama have been fighting for legal recognition and security over their ancestral lands. In the 1980s, the dispute came to a head when the Panamanian government created La Amistad International Park (PILA) and the Palo Seco Protected Forest—both of which overlap the Naso peoples’ traditional territories—without consulting with the indigenous people living there. Despite significant international support from the World Bank, attempts in 2003 and 2005 to secure governmental recognition of their collective land (comarca) failed due to lack of political will.
Finally, in 2020, the Panama Supreme Court ruled in their favor, titling and recognizing more than 620 square miles (160,000+ hectares) of Naso Tjër Di land, roughly half the size of Rhode Island. Informed by years of experience securing land rights and settling disputes, RFUS provided strategic legal support for what became the largest land-titling win for Panama’s indigenous peoples in decades.
The ruling also advanced the incorporation of international human rights law into the Panamanian legal framework and set a precedent for the titling of indigenous peoples’ lands that overlap nationally protected areas, opening new opportunities for expanding recognition of indigenous peoples’ land rights in the country.
RFUS's experience in other countries—its ability to adapt, understand complex issues, and inject new ideas and spaces for interaction, like what’s been playing out on climate change on the international level—all of this adds great value to our work together.
A National Indigenous Leader’s Reflection on Our Partnership
Jean La Rose underlines the value of Rainforest Foundation US’s long-term support
When Jean La Rose first began collaborating with RFUS, the internet still had a dial-up tone. “I believe it was 1994,” La Rose says. No doubt: A lot has happened since then.
Jean La Rose is a leader of the Amerindian Peoples’ Association (APA), the national indigenous peoples’ organization in Guyana. Over the years, RFUS and APA have partnered on everything from mapping and community-level capacity building to lobbying successfully for the reforms enshrined in the Amerindian Act of 2006.
Through it all, land rights have been one of APA’s priority issues. La Rose detailed how APA was able to carry out research activities and produce reports that delve into the land tenure situations of 5 of Guyana’s regions. These reports will significantly strengthen their advocacy work.
“The continuity and closeness of our working relationship with RFUS—not only providing funds, but working physically close to the project allowed us to achieve this landmark work,” she remarks.
“RFUS’s experience in other countries—its ability to adapt, understand complex issues, and inject new ideas and spaces for interaction, like what’s been playing out on climate change on the international level—all of this adds great value to our work together.”
Human Rights
A step forward in the Saweto community’s fight for justice
In 2014, the Saweto community in Peru was struck by the tragic assasination of four of their leaders at the hands of illegal loggers. Their families and community members sought nothing more than a proper investigation and prosecution of those responsible. In the years since, they have instead struggled against a lagging judicial system and faced harassment, in addition to other forms of intimidation.
To support the Saweto community in their fight for justice, RFUS has provided legal and advocacy assistance over the past six years. In 2020, collective efforts helped reach a milestone: The case was heard by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, and a prosecutorial hearing advanced after six postponements. The case continues and RFUS will stand by the community of Saweto community as they seek justice for their husbands, sons, brothers, and leaders brutally murdered for their courageous activism.
During a key moment in the Miners Out, COVID Out! campaign, images of Yanomami art and passages were projected onto the Brazilian Congress to raise awareness of their struggle. In this image, the images are accompanied by the words “Yanomami protect the spirit of the earth.” Credit: Adriano Machado / ISA
Garnering global support with “Miners Out, COVID Out!”
The mortality rate from COVID-19 for Brazil’s indigenous peoples is double the rate of the rest of the nation—a reality exemplified by the struggles of the Yanomami and Ye’kwana peoples of the Amazon. Historically, these populations have been afflicted by malaria and measles epidemics wrought upon them by invaders during gold rushes in the 1970s and 1980s. Now, roughly half of the Yanomami live in communities within three miles of illegal gold mining sites, exposing them to a surge in COVID-19.
Facing a risk of ethnocide, the Forum of Yanomami and Ye’kwana Leaders asked the Brazilian public and the global community to sign a petition to pressure Brazilian authorities to mobilize efforts for the complete and immediate removal of 20,000 illegal gold miners from their territory. Together with our partners, RFUS helped amplify their campaign, which managed to collect more than 400,000 signatures calling on authorities to evict the illegal invaders. The “Miners Out, Covid Out!” campaign received worldwide attention.
In a scenario where threats to the Amazon are increasingly sophisticated, RFUS is an organization that is open to innovate and find new models to defend forests and the rights of indigenous peoples.
Meet Our Peru Program Project Coordinator
Wendy Pineda brings information and technology to indigenous communities
Wendy Pineda has dedicated her professional life to partnering with indigenous peoples to protect their ancestral lands. When she joined RFUS in 2015, she dreamt of building a coalition that supports indigenous peoples in using their knowledge to conserve forests and fight climate change.
As a land management specialist, she develops tools and conducts trainings for indigenous community members on Geographical Information Systems, mapping, geographic and environmental engineering, and satellite remote sensing. In just a few years, she has seen the network of communities using territorial monitoring technology grow and adapt to meet the demands of any situation.
“RFUS works directly with indigenous peoples without intermediaries. This allows us to provide responses adapted to the needs of each of our partners,” says Pineda. “In a scenario where threats to the Amazon are increasingly sophisticated, RFUS is an organization that is open to innovate and find new models to defend forests and the rights of indigenous peoples.”
This ability to adapt and innovate was life-saving when the pandemic hit. In early 2020, Pineda assisted in transforming the indigenous forest patrol network into a system focused on humanitarian assistance. This, she says, was the biggest challenge of the year—repurposing forest monitoring technology to transfer information about COVID-19 and activating the network she helped build to bring medicine and food to communities that had been isolated by closures during the pandemic.
As a new year approaches, Pineda is looking forward to strategizing about how RFUS can continue to expand and “provide new solutions to improve forest control with a gender, social inclusion, and intercultural approach.”
A Message From Our Board Chair
This has been a difficult and unusual year by all measures, one that has introduced new challenges for people across the globe. In the face of this, however, Rainforest Foundation US has continued to build on our long-term mission of forest protection, planting seeds for the future even as we respond to meet the emergency needs of our indigenous partners during this pandemic. As we look ahead, I am excited to share some goals for 2021.
In the short-term, the immediate threat of COVID-19 in indigenous rainforest communities is far from over and we are committed to continue safeguarding those communities: That’s why we were a fiscal sponsor and key advisor to the Amazon Emergency Fund, which proved that an indigenous-led fund can bring critical relief to forest guardians. With a $2 million donation from the French Government this year, we plan to reach an even wider set of communities, and provide them with longer-term support.
After two years of preparation, we are excited to soon publish a landmark study which analyzes the efficacy of our community-based forest monitoring program. We anticipate the results will confirm what we have experienced and witnessed over the course of our 30 year history: that supporting indigenous peoples in titling and protecting their lands is a low-cost, high-return strategy to stop deforestation and combat climate change.
In addition, we will expand our Rainforest Alert territorial monitoring program in partnership with indigenous organizations in Panama, Peru, Guyana, and Brazil. This program is one of the most impactful and cost-effective ways to protect lands from encroachment. We estimate that the program can prevent nearly 4,000 square miles (roughly 1 million hectares) of deforestation over the coming decade.
On a personal note, my own commitment to forest protection has never been greater. Like every donor, I know that each dollar I give could go elsewhere, to different organizations with different needs. I focus on RFUS because I know it’s the best way to solve the most pressing issue of our generation.
And as Board Chairman, I commit to you that my consistent and primary focus is ensuring that your contribution has the greatest possible impact in the greatest possible way. The RFUS team is lean, focused, and highly productive; we are dedicated to our mission of saving the planet—saving our planet. Thanks to your help, we can do exactly that.
Sincerely,
John Copeland Chair of the Board of Directors, Rainforest Foundation US Managing Partner, Wealth Partners Capital Group
Revenues & Expenses
Giving that builds resilient communities that protect forests to help fight the climate emergency
Your support has helped strengthen local indigenous communities and regional indigenous peoples’ organizations in their ability to protect the forests. Over this pandemic year in particular, you have contributed to building resilience in communities when they were most vulnerable. We couldn’t have done it without you. Thank you!
Revenue and Support
Total Revenue and Support: $7,427,767
Expenses
Total Expenses: $5,679,246
Assets
All financial figures past and present can be found on Rainforest Foundation US’s fiscal year 990 filings on our Financials & Transparency page.
Even though we strive to be as green as possible, our working lives cause pollution, and supporting RFUS helps us to set the balance.
Appreciating the Earth through Charitable Giving
Tom Greenway’s company helps organizations that help the world
In the coming years, Tom Greenway hopes to see more companies like his support RFUS. Greenway, the Founder and Managing Director of 3dtotal, an educational resource platform for online artists, gives a portion of his company’s annual profits to RFUS.
“Donating to RFUS is a very efficient way to help the environment,” Greenway says. “Even though we strive to be as green as possible, our working lives cause pollution, and supporting RFUS helps us to set the balance.”
Greenway is dedicated to environmental sustainability in both his professional and personal life. Canopy Press, an imprint of 3dtotal’s small publisher 3dtotal Publishing, brings art and design books focused on sustainable living and the environment into the world. When he’s not working, Greenway practices green woodworking and stewards a share of woodland in the UK where he lives.
What does the RFUS’s mission mean to him? “Rainforests are the most wonderful and essential places on earth and we feel very lucky that organizations such as RFUS have been established to fight to protect them,” Greenway says. “A lot of good work results in each donation we make.”
By investing directly in indigenous communities, RFUS connects indigenous peoples with the tools, training, and resources to be effective advocates and protectors of the forests they call home. Our global, regional, and local partners are the key to realizing our mission. When you invest in us, you invest in them.
Global/Regional Partners
Partners in Brazil
Partners in Guyana
Partners in Panama
Partners in Peru
The Rainforest US mission to protect the rainforests and the planet's climate and the rights of indigenous peoples with a focus on sustainable development is sorely needed.
A World Traveler and CEO Supports the Rainforest
Jeremy Shepherd sells pearls and champions sustainable development
When Jeremy Shepherd thinks of RFUS, he thinks of his indigenous friends in South America who rely directly on the Amazon for their livelihoods.
“Their rights are being trampled upon and their forests are being destroyed,” he says. “The RFUS mission to protect the rainforests and the planet’s climate and the rights of indigenous peoples with a focus on sustainable development is sorely needed.”
Shepherd, the Founder and CEO of the world’s largest online pearl company, Pearl Paradise, has traveled the world: first as the son of a U.S. Army officer, then later as a flight attendant. He is fluent in Japanese, Spanish, and Micronesian, and has lived in Japan, Mexico, and the South Pacific.
It was Shepherd’s love of other cultures that inspired Pearl Paradise, as he began to import pearls during his travels to Asia. Over two decades, he has traveled to pearl-producing areas all over the world and formed relationships with people who are directly affected by deforestation.
That’s why he particularly values RFUS’s Rainforest Alert forest patrol program, which provides training and tools to indigenous organizations to monitor and secure their territories using cost-effective technology like smartphones and drones.
Shepherd hopes to see an expansion of Rainforest Alert in the next few years. “The rainforests are the lungs of the earth,” he says. “When they go, our civilization will likely follow.”
Support Our Work
Join us in creating a more sustainable future for generations to come
Rainforest Foundation US is tackling the major challenges of our day: deforestation, the climate crisis, and human rights violations. Your commitment moves us one step closer to creating a more sustainable and just future.
When you donate to RFUS, you support indigenous communities in Central and South America in their fight for their rights and for the nature we all depend on.
Your contribution makes the following possible:
Providing legal support to indigenous communities as they pursue rights to their lands
Training in state-of-the-art land management and surveillance to avoid illegal deforestation
Strengthening of administrative capacity in indigenous-led organizations, including accounting and project management
Please consider making a monthly contribution. Our monthly donors provide vital and reliable aid to our indigenous partners as they work to ensure that tropical forests can keep capturing and storing carbon while also producing fresh air and clean water for generations to come.
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