As women in rural malawian families are usually responsible to cook for their family members, they are also the ones who predominantly collect firewood, as well as to pump and carry water. 
Women are therefore the ones whose training will have the biggest impact on how they perform these practices for example: If a tree is cut off at about 1m height above ground it will coppice, if however the roots are dug out to get more firewood, then a close to irreversible damage will incur, so training is very important. 
By training and hiring mostly women for all steps required to restore a landscape we give them the basic tools and education to bring sustainable change to their landscape - as well as changing the basic income structures as their work often becomes the main source of income for the family.

Technology knows no barriers and we are yet to innovate and discover more with a changing world.

By using the underwater cameras it has allowed us to bring ahead the live viewing and monitoring where previosuly we were limited. Thus allowing us to better engage with local fisher community, for them to get a sense of ownership and unite to better understand and protect this ecosystem. 

This has also facilitated the data sharing of the status of the reef locally and across different channels but also to open the door for more scientific collaboration locally and internationally. 

This project cannot succeed on its own. For the long-term success of coral reef restoration, it was important to develop strong collaboration with locals, fisher communities, other stakeholders. Through the Tech4Nature partnership, we were able to get more support and engage locally with other stakeholders.

By engaging the fisher communities in coral reef restoration from the beginning of the project and allowing them to take part in eco-tourism activities. This not only saved the area from further damage but allowed the fishermen to generate more incomes through sustainable touristic activities while also enjoying the overspill of increased fish abundance in the area.

Inspired by our transparent way of GPS-mapping our more than 2000 installed Zoë-pumps we knew we had to apply the same principle and expand it to show and document our tree planting projects. 

Now we have an elegant solution: We create GPS-Polygons of planting sites by walking around it with a simple smart phone app. We then import these boundary files into the drone mission planning app and fly a drone over the planting site capturing thousands of images. 

These are then stitched into a large photogrammetric map that can transparently show and document landscape change through the work happening on the ground. Additionally all workers inspecting the sites take thousands of GPS-photos which are displayed on our custom built map as well. 

Local government authorities and a few private parties are involved in the trade.  Collaboration is greatly appreciated which is the key to the success of the stormwater trade. 

At the early stage of the trading platform planning, public education and outreach were conducted to promote the Sponge City concept and to introduce trade. 

Many local community residents come to visit and learn, which stimulated the residents' interest in the utilization of rainwater resources.

This is a landscape approach where farmers leave deliberately selected native tree species on their farm land either as tree stand or as co-exsisting with crops or both. The farmer manages the trees in such a way that they do not deprive crops of the growing factors. Otherwise the trees in the farm lands improve the soil fertility and structure, protect soil from erosion while supplies wood energy and livestock fodder to the farmer. The silvicultural practices include pruning, treaming,  thinning and coppicing.

Although Gomeza Community used Self-drive to restore the forest reserve, the community attracted attention from government and non-governmental organisations. The partnerships led to provision of technical capacity building to the community on sivicultural aspects. Other insitutions also supported the community in their vision. This led to reduced resource need per institution to work with the community.

The communities realised that they need to take actionin order achieve their dreams and support their ecosystem to retain its functions. They set up social structures and identified responsibilities in the form of positions and work plans. The community use volunteerism to carry out their duties nd drive the restoration efforts. They also formed their own by-laws to manage the Gomeza forest reserve, thereby adding not only social but also a regulatory framework set up to serve their needs.

A conservation enterprise under the REFRESH Project provided business and technical backstopping support and developed strategic business alliances with other enterprises to leverage markets for our restoration effort beneficiaries.