Who We Are
PURE PLANET develops reforestation projects in partnership with fair trade cooperatives throughout the Global South, providing charismatic carbon credits to support local farming communities while fighting climate change.
PURE PLANET was started by a core team of social entrepreneurs including the founder of ALTER ECO, a leading fair trade brand. After ten years of close partnerships with fair trade cooperatives throughout the Global South, PURE PLANET is playing a key role as an offspring of ALTER ECO by working with their cooperative partners to develop reforestation projects. Since we began working with cooperatives in 1998, it was immediately apparent that restoration efforts would be essential for the long-term viability of the farms. PURE PLANET is responding to that need by financing agro-forestry projects and selling verified carbon credits on the voluntary market, which simultaneously create additional revenue for local farming communities.
Along with our partners, we have planted 2 million trees, and we have a goal of planting a total of 12 million trees by the end of 2012. PURE PLANET strives for Objective Carbon Zero, our way of contributing to a healthier and more productive planet.
“We need to stop thinking about these issues in isolation — each with its own champion, constituency and agenda — and deal with them in an integrated way, the way they actually occur on the ground. We tend to think about climate change as just an energy issue, but it’s also about land use: one-third of greenhouse gas emissions come from tropical deforestation and agriculture. So we need to preserve forests and other ecosystems to solve climate change, not only to save species. So we’ll need to do that without clearing more forests and draining more wetlands, which means farmers will need new technologies and practices to grow more food on the same land they use today — with less water. Healthy forests, wetlands and grasslands not only preserve biodiversity and store carbon, they also help buffer the impacts of climate change. So our success in tackling climate change, poverty, food security and biodiversity loss will depend on finding integrated solutions from the land.”
- Glenn Prickett, Conservation International Senior Vice President, NYTimes
