Recently, members of the Ripple Effect and Riverford teams have visited each other’s offices to share updates on the Responsible Carbon project in Ethiopia, an exciting collaboration between our two organisations which will see 27,000 tonnes of CO2 sequestered over the next 15 years.
In March, Riverford’s Head of Sustainability, Zac Goodall, and People Engagement Specialist, Sidney Raynor, came to Newton St Loe, to join us for one of our International Learning Forums – a monthly session which brings the teams from all our country programmes together to hear more about a particular aspect of our work. Zac presented on the design and implementation of the Carbon project, alongside three representatives from our own Programmes team: Mesfin Zenebe, Natural Resource Management trainer working directly with project farmers in Ethiopia, Meshark Sikuku, Farm Systems and Sustainability Co-ordinator based at our Nairobi leadership hub in Kenya, and Fiona Hill, Programme Executive linking the UK office back to the in-country teams.
Zac, who visited the project in October 2022, described how impressed he had been at the farmers’ ingenious use of their land:
“One of the things which struck me the most, which I hadn’t fully understood before we got to the project site, is just how integrated the trees were into everyone’s systems, and how bespoke it was for each farmer - because obviously they know their land better than anyone else. Some trees were put right into the middle of areas of cropping, some were put in front of people’s houses and protected from livestock with eucalyptus cages, while others were put along the outside of cropping areas in small patches of grass, where people knew that runnels of water would reach them when the rains came.” - Zac Goodall, Head of Sustainability at Riverford
Zac also shared an update on Riverford’s progress towards net zero through other means, which, importantly, prioritises cutting carbon emissions at source. Why not have a look at their latest sustainability report to find out more?
A few weeks later, Ripple Effect’s Programme Executive Fiona travelled down to Wash Farm in Devon (Riverford HQ), to present to Riverford co-owners on the project alongside Zac. Of her visit, Fiona said:
“It was wonderful to visit Wash Farm and discuss the Responsible Carbon project with Riverford co-owners. We are delighted to have such a great partnership with an organisation who are committed to putting communities at the heart of their net zero plans, to ensure there are genuine social and environmental benefits alongside much-needed carbon sequestration.” - Fiona Hill, Programme Executive at Ripple Effect
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