Addicted to Plastic

This last Saturday, June 5th, was World Environment Day. World Environment Day is a day to celebrate and advocate for positive, environmental action. Here at Plant With Purpose, we like to think that every day is environment day.

Not only do we work with rural farmers in developing countries to restore and replenish the local environments that they depend on, we do our best to adopt as many eco-friendly lifestyle choices as we can here in the United States. In honor of World Environment Day, we’d like to share a post by guest blogger and former intern, Jimmy Lee, on his journey to decrease his environmental impact by limiting his use of plastic water bottles.

Addicted to Plastic by Jimmy Lee

I have a confession to make: I’m a serial water bottle user. And I’m talking about those 20oz bottles, which my family loves to purchase. It’s wasteful I know, and I’m embarrassed to admit our addiction. Did you know that in 2007, plastic bottle contributed to over 12% of landfill waste generated in the US1, and almost 70% of recyclable plastic water bottles are never recycled2? I’m embarrassed to say, we’ve become part of the statistics and not the solution. So why the serial water bottle use? Convenience. Habit. Which are probably the same reasons that many other serial water bottle users give. However, I’m proud to say, I’ve recently begun a process of change for a more sustainable and environmental friendly method of water consumption for my family. First of all, I’ve began using a reusable water bottle which I fill up with water whenever I can (water fountain at the gym, water cooler at the office...) thus decreasing my water bottle usage at home. I take my trusty water bottle everywhere I go now, which has not only decreased my water bottle usage but has also allowed me to have a healthier lifestyle by avoiding sugary sodas and juices during lunch. Second, I’ve begun boiling tap water for drinking purposes at home. To get rid of the tap water taste, I sometimes add a bit of barley tea before cooling it, which is perfect for the San Diego summer. Third, by not only purchasing less water from stores, our family now prefers to buy water sold in bigger containers. Although I don’t think my family will ever be able to phase out the habit of purchasing water, we can definitely try our best to decrease the consumption of plastic bottles as much as possible.

For fun (well, my definition of fun), I’ve gone ahead and calculated the amount of plastic bottles I would be saving if I could go completely bottle-less: Let’s say that I would consume an average of ten 20oz plastic bottles each week, and each 20oz plastic bottle is about 24 grams in weight3. That would mean that I would generate about 240g of plastic per week and about 87.6kg of plastic per year, which is about 1.2 more than my weight. If I don’t change my ways, I would be consuming more than my body-weight in plastic bottles each year!

Statistics aside, I’m thankful for being in a part of the world where safe and fresh water is readily available to my family. And also thankful that Plant With Purpose works in many countries where people may not have readily available access to fresh water like we do. If you want to find out more about the various water sanitation and water management projects that Plant With Purpose has been involved with in other countries, please check out our Outreach Coordinator’s blog post from International World Water Day this past March: http://plantwithpurpose.blogspot.com/2010/03/today-is-world-water-day.html 1 Container Recycling Institute 2 State of CA - Department of Conservation 3 Reduce. Reuse. Recycle.

Football Fundraising Fun

by Corbyn

Get your pom-poms and your megaphones out, it's time for the first ever Plant With Purpose Flag Football Fundraiser! Albert Einstein Academy Charter Middle School is hosting a teachers versus students football game to raise money for Plant With Purpose. This Wednesday the 9th, at 5:30pm, come support the class's hard work and creativity!

You may remember 'Florestaval' last December where students from Emily Small's 6th grade class at AEACMS put on an amazing show and raised over $680 dollars for Plant With Purpose's programs. Well, a semester later there is a whole new batch of enthusiastic students

who have been learning all semester about each of the countries Plant With Purpose works in and what it looks like to treat root causes rather than symptoms when it comes to alleviating poverty. They are ready to throw a Football Fundraiser like you wouldn't believe! There will be a raffle, food and drinks donated by generous local businesses, and even some skits and a video at halftime to get the audience even more pumped up about seeing these students' passion to make a difference!

After the Florestaval event last year, Emily shared her own eagerness for Plant With Purpose, and why she teaches this specific curriculum to two of her 6th-8th grade classes, "My students are learning about deforestation and soil degradation, as well as looking into the solutions that Plant With Purpose has been doing to help the rural poor for so long now. Plant With Purpose is helping them become global citizens, aware of the world around them and passionate about making a positive impact." These classes are aptly titled Root(ed).

Join me, other Plant With Purpose staff, and San Diego parents and teachers as we cheer on and support the students of Albert Einstein Academy, and please forgive me when I say that I most definitely will be 'root'ing for the students to pull out a win against their teachers!

Albert Einstein Academy

3035 Ash Street

San Diego, CA 92102-1718 (619) 795-1190

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Corbyn Small serves as Plant With Purpose’s Outreach Coordinator. He cultivates relationships with donors, churches, artists and musicians to generate interest and enthusiasm for Plant With Purpose’s life-changing programs.

The new Plant With Purpose shirt is here!

Available only at our office or events where Plant With Purpose is represented! Pug not included.

Improved Livelihoods in Tanzania through Organic Agriculture

by Kate McElhinney

Plant With Purpose is excited to announce that we have been awarded a grant for $500,000 from the United States Agency of International Development (USAID) for our programs in Northern Tanzania!

The goal of this project is to see improved livelihoods through organic agriculture over a three-year time period. Initially, 300 households will participate. The main objectives will be to build the capacity of farmers by enhancing organic vegetable farming techniques and entrepreneurial and business skills, as well as develop the market capacity and create long-term strategies for getting organic vegetables products to markets.

Educating farmers about the benefits of organic farming, organic agriculture marketing principles, and the identification of the crops that have the highest potential for newly identified markets such as tomatoes, baby vegetables, mushrooms, and carrots will be key in helping them to improve their livelihoods. Households, especially women-headed, will become empowered by being able to provide a sustainable means to improve their livelihood. Additionally, this project will help farmers in Tanzania to plan long-term strategies for expanding the marketing of their crops.

With the help of this grant, over time we hope to see a 20% increase in the percentage of participating households that can afford 3 meals a day throughout the year, and a 40% increase in the percentage of households with income from organic agriculture coming at least 9 months of the year.

This will make a huge difference in the lives of the rural poor in Tanzania, and we are grateful for our partnership with USAID and the opportunities this grant will bring. We will be sure to keep you posted on the progress of this exciting program!

To learn more about the communities we work with in Tanzania, click here.

Kate McElhinney serves as the Marketing Coordinator for Plant With Purpose. She plays an integral role in executing the company’s marketing campaigns and PR efforts. Kate also coordinates the annual gala and oversees the production of the company newsletter, The Sower.

Shop Kellogg Garden Products!

by Corbyn

Over the last year of blogging we have shared a lot of exciting things that are happening internationally in our programs as well as here locally in our San Diego office and across the US. We are excited to say that we have posted over 300 blogs on topics ranging from reports on the relief aid provided by our staff in Haiti, to the 'Mighty Mamas' in our programs for International Women's Day, or even our own San Diego office's participation in Bike to Work Day and ongoing discussions about hot topics like 'bad aid.'

The bottom line is, we have enjoyed bringing these blogs to you and this is a great way for us to keep you up to date with what is going on at Plant With Purpose! Consider it your daily snippet about international development, environmental stewardship, current events both locally and abroad, and just a friendly

ongoing conversation with the development department at Plant With Purpose. If you haven't subscribed to the blog via email yet, we'd like to encourage you to do so! The email will come daily to your inbox and we promise to keep making the effort to bring you high quality and thought provoking material. Just pop your email into the 'subscribe via email' section on the far right side of the blog.

Today we are excited to announce that our partnership with Kellogg Garden Products is off to a great start! As a part of their Earth Rich Initiative, Kellogg has committed to supporting Plant With Purpose's mission to teach sustainable agriculture, micro-enterprise, and leadership training. Recently Kellogg added a section to their brand new website that has a great highlight of Plant With Purpose. This is a big deal for Plant With Purpose because Kellogg has such a great reputation all across the West as a great family-owned provider of garden products. Their customers understand the connection between the environment and poverty, nutrition, and health. Check out their new site here. We are looking forward to our partnership growing even more in the future as both Kellogg and Plant With Purpose continue to flourish!

Thanks to all of our blog followers! We appreciate your feedback and hope that you continue to share the blog with your friends and family. What do you all think about possibly adding a gardening tip of the week to our blog?

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The Development Department (from left to right) Doug Satre- Director of Development and Outreach, Corbyn Small- Outreach Coordinator, Courtney Pate- temporary Development Assistant, Aly Lewis- Grant Writer, Kate Nare (previously McElhinney... congrats Kate!)- Marketing Coordinator

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Let's Make a Deal

by Aly Lewis

When I was little, my younger brother, who would begrudgingly clear his dinner plate and haphazardly splash water on a few greasy pans when asked to do the dishes, would miraculously transform into a busy beaver when given the chance to earn some dough. Always looking to make a deal, my brother would do any chore, no matter how difficult or disgusting, as long as it was in his economic best interest. He would weed eat through blackberry bramble in the mid-summer heat or rid the backyard of dog poop if it meant he could buy more chocolate milks, Snickers, or Pokemon cards.

As my parents quickly discovered, money is a powerful motivator. Why should it be any different in the developing world?

Plant With Purpose understands how effective, and necessary, economic incentives can be. In working with communities to reforest watersheds and restore their environments, Plant With Purpose recognizes the need for “environmental” activities such as reforestation or switching to eco-friendly latrines to be economically profitable. And, unlike my brother, these families aren’t just trying to stock up on junk food or buy the latest Heely’s roller shoes; for hundreds of thousands of rural poor around the world, finding ways to make money is a matter of life and death.

That’s why Plant With Purpose’s integrated program empowers rural farmers to restore productivity to their land in order to create economic opportunity out of environmental restoration.

One exciting illustration of how Plant With Purpose makes environmental restoration an economically profitable endeavor can be seen in our Tanzania program. Plant With Purpose has trained over 1,000 Tanzanian farmers in sustainable agriculture techniques. As a result, farmers have experienced improved soil quality and increased crop yields. In fact, 76% of farmers working with Plant With Purpose have witnessed improved soil quality on their land. The improvement in soil quality has also led to increased yields ranging between 50% to 200% more production, and enables farmers to extend their growing season, creating greater economic stability.

Building on the program’s success, Plant With Purpose is collaborating with USAID to implement a three-year program that will help farmers maximize local markets to receive more money for the crops they grow, improving their livelihoods and fostering long-term growth and prosperity. As farmers, especially women, build their financial and agricultural skills as well as their confidence, they are able to contribute to family income and well-being in significant ways, such as providing their families with quality fruits and vegetables to consume or sending their children to school with the extra income they are able to earn from increased yields.

This is just one example of how Plant With Purpose empowers farmers to create economic opportunity out of environmental restoration. By combining personal transformation, economic renewal, and environmental restoration, Plant With Purpose is bringing hope and dignity to the rural poor.

Now that’s a deal my brother would be proud of!

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Aly Lewis is Plant With Purpose’s Grant Writer. She researches funding opportunities, writes proposals, and submits progress reports on funding received. She also writes the content for Plant With Purpose's Sponsor A Village program. Pictured to the left is Aly (the tiger) and her two brothers on Halloween of 1990-something. Her deal maker brother is the little dragon.

Plant With Purpose Helps Haitians Prepare for Hurricane Season

by Kate McElhinney

Today marks the official start of hurricane season in the Caribbean. Unfortunately, this season is predicted to be one of the wettest on record according to the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which estimates that as many as 23 tropical storms will hit the Caribbean this year. Tropical Storm Agatha already ravaged parts of Central America last weekend, and more storms are predicted to be brewing.

For the hundreds of thousands of Haitian earthquake victims, hurricane season looms as another treacherous obstacle. Many only have tarps or fraying tents to protect them in a major storm, and eroded hillsides threaten to become deadly mudslides when provoked by heavy rains.

Despite this grim prediction, Plant With Purpose remains dedicated to helping rural farmers to prepare for the rainy season. Our Haitian staff were on the ground in Haiti at the time of the earthquake and were able to respond immediately to the crisis. Though historically a sustainable development organization, we have expanded our post-earthquake role in Haiti to include aid efforts that promote long-term growth and prosperity, including our “Cash for Work” program and food and seed distribution. Since January 12th, we've raised nearly $1 million to help in these efforts.

Here are some quick statistics of our progress since January 12th:

-136,868 trees planted

-2,120 people employed through our “Cash for Work” program

-nearly 80,000 lbs. of bean seed distributed

-nearly 250,000 lbs. of rice distributed

-over 4 miles of road repaired

By employing local farmers, distributing food, and planting trees Plant With Purpose is supplying farmers with the tools and the knowledge they need to get back on their feet and replant and reforest their land before the hurricane season gets under way. Some farmers have already harvested bean crops, which provide nutritious food for their families as well as a valuable product to sell at the market.

Stay tuned for more updates on Haiti, and if you would like to help or learn more please visit: www.plantwithpurpose.org.

Kate McElhinney serves as the Marketing Coordinator for Plant With Purpose. She plays an integral role in executing the company’s marketing campaigns and PR efforts. Kate also coordinates the annual gala and oversees the production of the company newsletter, The Sower.