From Ridge to Reef: Conservation and Community in Guatemala 

Early one morning in the coastal Guatemalan town of Livingston, Mayra Lineth Pop Maquin rings a bell outside of a one-story beige building.

“The clinic is now open!” she calls with a smile.

As she makes her way to the building’s entrance, she beckons to a line of women and children, inviting them to join her inside.  

Healthcare access can be hard to come by in rural areas like Livingston, a town in the department of Izabal, which sits where the mouth of the Río Dulce meets the Caribbean Sea. That is why Mayra, in her capacity as an agroforestry counselor with FUNDAECO’s Healthy and Empowered Women and Girls Program, brings healthcare services directly to the communities. At the clinic, Mayra will spend her day delivering essential health services to the community, from taking an inventory of medications to assisting nurses with physical examinations. 

Started in 1990 to protect biodiversity and create protected areas in the Caribbean region of Guatemala, FUNDAECO is the nonprofit behind the Healthy and Empowered Women and Girls Program, as well as many other initiatives that contribute to social and environmental wellbeing in the country. Today, FUNDAECO operates 21 clinics across Caribbean Guatemala—the largest network in the region.  

Healthcare is just one component of their many social initiatives. Education is also a core part of the mission.  

“We deliver talks and workshops about topics including sexual health and family planning,” says Mayra. “We also offer workshops to share techniques for food preparation, soap making, and baking. These workshops empower and encourage entrepreneurship among women in rural areas since they often do not have resources or paid jobs outside of their homes.”

As a member of the Indigenous Q’eqchi’ community, Mayra understands the need for these services firsthand. “We as Indigenous women have limited resources,” she says. “The more isolated a woman is in a rural area and the more Indigenous she is, the fewer opportunities she has to participate. That is why we are making these efforts to get them involved.”  

For Mayra, working for the FUNDAECO program is also a way of giving back. When Mayra was only 14, her family had a very different plan for her: instead of finishing school, they decided, she would marry a 21-year-old man whom she did not know.  

But Mayra resisted. “Our ancestors told us that our role was to follow in their footsteps, to get married, to have children,” she recalls, “but I did not want to continue that custom because my ambition for my future was different. I wanted to discover the world and travel. I wanted to continue studying, so I took another path. It wasn’t fair that only men had that opportunity to discover the world. We as women also have the opportunity and the right to discover other things and continue studying.”

Mayra had learned about her rights through her own participation in the Healthy and Empowered Women and Girls Program; she therefore went on to prioritize her education, just as she wanted. 

“The Healthy and Empowered Women and Girls Program has changed my life and given me the opportunity to continue studying,” Mayra says.

With support from a FUNDAECO scholarship, Mayra continued her schooling and eventually went on to college, where she graduated as a forestry engineer. 

Today, she is a leader in her community. In addition to her work at the clinic, she travels around to the homes of community members who have received chickens through the program, monitoring the health of the birds and providing advice as needed. She also oversees the very scholarship program that enabled her to receive an education. And she is currently mentoring 14 girls who are interning with the program—girls eager to learn, just like herself. In working with the next generation, she draws on her own experience to ensure the girls are informed about everything from the prevention of child marriage to reproductive health. 

“I feel a responsibility to share these issues with girls to help other children get ahead,” says Mayra.

If Mayra’s experience is any indication, the program has had an incredible impact. Since 2012, 165 girls like Mayra have received scholarships, and an additional 72,485 community members have gained access to vital health services.  

This progress is made possible through the work of FUNDAECO. And FUNDAECO’s programs are made possible by REDD+. 

FUNDAECO: Protecting Forests through REDD+ 

At its core, explains Karen Aguilar, a forest conservation expert and FUNDAECO’s REDD+ manager, “REDD+ is a mechanism that not only seeks to protect the forest and prevent carbon emissions from going into the atmosphere, but also seeks to ensure that populations living near or within these forests have a quality of life and have the opportunity to participate in forest conservation.”

REDD+ stands for “Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation,” with the plus sign indicating activities such as conservation, sustainable forest management, and the enhancement of forest carbon stocks.  

But, as Karen underscores, REDD+ projects couple climate impacts with immense benefits for local communities, such as the healthcare and educational access provided through the Healthy and Empowered Women and Girls Program. After all, the health of a community and its forests are inextricably linked.  

That’s why FUNDAECO launched the REDD+ Project for Caribbean Guatemala (Verra Project 1622) in 2012. Located in the department of Izabal and belonging to the biologically diverse Mesoamerican Biological Corridor, the forests in the project area provide important national and international ecosystem services.  

However, prior to the start of the project, these forests were experiencing a continued reduction in biomass due largely to small-scale farmers and medium- to large-scale cattle ranchers who sought to expand their activities, or who were displaced by agro-industrial expansion. Given that these forests have also historically been an important source of income for local families, who periodically harvest small amounts of timber when economic needs arise, FUNDAECO initially struggled to persuade community members to halt deforestation. 

Knowing they needed larger-scale financial support to have a significant impact on the region’s climate and community, the FUNDAECO team embarked on several years of project design and a feasibility study before moving forward with a REDD+ project. Jointly registered with Verra’s Verified Carbon Standard (VCS) Program and Climate, Community & Biodiversity Standards (CCBS) Program, the project enables a self-sustaining financial model, generating carbon credits that protect the forests while producing income for the families who once farmed them.  

REDD+ projects undergo a robust process that includes design, validation, and annual verification.  

“Verra allows us to guarantee the quality of the project through internationally recognized protocols and methodologies,” explains Karen. “Every year, we carry out a monitoring process of all the project activities, including activities directed at the communities and activities directed at the protection of biodiversity and the forest, and we demonstrate to a third-party auditor recognized by Verra that these activities occurred.”

Once the auditor confirms that the project complies with all of Verra’s requirements, the tonnes of carbon reduced or avoided generate carbon credits, which can be traded on the global voluntary carbon markets.  

When the credits are sold, says Karen, “resources come to us and are reinvested in activities for the project, but they are also an incentive for the landowners. We are paying the owners who are involved in this project so that they can carry out their conservation activities directly.” 

The REDD+ mechanism has been transformative for both FUNDAECO and the communities within the project area. 

“FUNDAECO has been responsible for protecting the forests of the Caribbean region of Guatemala for a long time, but we never had sufficient or permanent resources,” says Karen. “Now, the REDD+ project allows us to have access to the resources needed to protect the project.”

Partnering with Verra also enables FUNDAECO to scale up its operations to maximize impact. “Verra allows us to reach audiences in the markets, which is something that a local non-governmental organization wouldn’t be able to do alone,” Karen says. 

Today, the REDD+ Project for Caribbean Guatemala protects 55,000 hectares of forest and has prevented the deforestation of nearly 18,000 hectares. FUNDAECO works with over 1,000 private, municipal, and national owners of forest plots, which span all sizes: from less than half a hectare to 150 hectares. Bringing together this many landowners involved an enormous educational and outreach effort on FUNDAECO’s part; they signed over 700 bilateral contracts and conducted Free, Prior, and Informed Consent processes with more than 3,000 participants, from local teachers and pastors to the regional governor and ministers of the environment. They also held large communal assemblies, including Maya ceremonies, to ensure strong endorsement by local Indigenous communities.  

Their efforts paid off. Now, FUNDAECO operates one of the largest grouped projects in the world, with each landowner united around the cause of conservation—not deforestation. 

This mission is furthered by other members of the community who carry out project activities, from agroforestry counselors like Mayra to teams that monitor the forests and their biodiversity.  

“Thanks to these activities, communities are more aware of the importance of caring for these ecosystems,” says Karen.

Community Leaders as Conservationists 

Emilio Pitán Che, a Q’eqchi’ leader who works for FUNDAECO, has devoted his life to these ecosystems. “We as a community, as Indigenous people, know what it means to be in a forest because we like to be there, because we were born there,” he says.  

Born and raised in Livingston, Emilio now coordinates the FUNDAECO chapter in the Administration of the Sarstún River Protected Area. 

When Emilio joined FUNDAECO, says Karen, the goal was to bring his community and the organization together to shape a shared vision for the forest. 

In the decade that Emilio has been with the organization, his relationship with FUNDAECO has blossomed into something mutually beneficial. “As FUNDAECO opened Emilios’s eyes to the vast world of conservation, he in turn opened ours to the deeper truth that caring for the forest also means walking with the Q’eqchi’,” Karen says. 

Emilio now works with around 40 Indigenous communities in his coordinator role; specifically, he has helped several of these communities acquire legal claims on their land, which allows them to participate in the REDD+ project as income-generating landowners.  

“I have dedicated myself to meeting the needs of communities so that there is that connection with FUNDAECO’s mission,” Emilio explains.

Emilio’s role also involves connecting the communities with governmental authorities, serving as an intermediary by, for example, managing the delivery of fertilizer to hundreds of families receiving agricultural incentives from the government. As Emilio says, “I am like a link between the community and the authorities.” 

Across his range of responsibilities, Emilio remembers to stay grounded. He takes his work seriously because he views the land as the most important resource for local communities, including his own family.  

“My passion is something natural,” he says. “It is a human commitment with the objective to ensure that my children and my grandchildren have the natural resources that I experienced in my childhood.”

Most of all, he emphasizes the urgency of addressing the climate crisis right here, right now.

“I do not understand the human being who is investing billions of dollars to transform life on Mars when our planet needs it here, in protecting the environment,” Emilio says. “My hope is that I can do something for the future of the entire human species on the planet.”

Biodiversity Monitoring and Forest Health 

While serving the human species is a critical mission for many at FUNDAECO, the organization also uses carbon credit finance from the REDD+ project to protect the animals living in its forests. 

“There has been talk around the world about empty forests: those forests that exist, that have trees, but that no longer have fauna species,” explains Karen Aguilar. “These forests are at risk of dying because the fauna is essential for their continuity.”

The Izabal region is particularly rich in biodiversity; given its proximity to both the mountains and the coast, the FUNDAECO team operates a “ridge-to-reef” conservation strategy. 

“We have species of amphibians that are unique in the country and the region, and we also have mammals that are important in Central America,” Karen says, “so the project seeks to do conservation from the mountain to the end of the basin that reaches the sea. This region is unique: it is the green Caribbean with a lot of tropical forests.”

To determine the health of these forests and their animal inhabitants, FUNDAECO works with two fundamental groups: birds, which are conservation indicators at the landscape level (i.e., large-scale), and amphibians, which are conservation indicators at the microhabitat level (i.e., a small, specific environment wherein particular conditions support certain species).  

Miguel Ramírez leads the field component of FUNDAECO’s bird monitoring program, which, having begun in 1992, is one of the longest-running programs of its type in Latin America. As a parataxonomist, he spends his days in the field collecting samples and assessing biodiversity. Miguel is one of more than 70 local residents who have received biological and technical training through FUNDAECO—a testament to the organization’s commitment to creating sustainable livelihoods while preserving the ecosystem. 

For Miguel, birds have been a lifelong fascination. “Since I was a child, I have listened to the birds singing every day,” he says. Now, through his work with FUNDAECO, he is dedicated to conducting studies and specializes in bird monitoring. 

Miguel’s work involves capturing the birds to assess their health and count the number of species. So far, the program has registered hundreds of species in the forests of Caribbean Guatemala.  

“Miguel provides us with very robust data that allows us to say when a population is in decline or if it is healthy,” Karen explains. “He is one of the national and Central American experts in bird monitoring. But I also tell Miguel that he has the hands of an angel. He handles the birds with gentleness. He understands them very well.”

However, as much as Miguel loves his work, his role also means bearing witness to the difficult realities of a changing climate.  

“There are much fewer of some species now than there were 20 years ago,” Miguel says. “When it rains less there are fewer flowers for the hummingbirds. There are fewer fruits for the birds that eat fruits.” 

“The climate crisis is real,” Karen notes. “It’s something we cannot ignore. We are living it day by day.” 

But through FUNDAECO’s monitoring programs, she adds, “We have such good and sufficient data that we can now say, for example, how climate change is affecting populations. In 2023, we saw the decline of two bird species and also amphibians for the first time, so this is fundamental data that is helping us make some decisions.” 

These decisions include creating ponds for the amphibians, which are important habitats for reproduction.  

While amphibian monitoring programs are not as common as those for birds or mammals, they are integral to climate change research, particularly given how sensitive amphibians are to variations in temperature. For this work in monitoring and protecting these indicator species, FUNDAECO’s project has received a Gold Level certification through the Climate, Community & Biodiversity Standards Program. The highest level of certification, this accolade acknowledges that the project demonstrates exceptional benefits in biodiversity conservation. 

Still, Miguel stresses that there is always more to do. His greatest wish is to train the next generation of community members to serve as species monitors, because education will lead to action.

“We are proud, and we would like other people to also get involved in this study, and to care,” he says. “Nobody takes care of what they don’t know. The first thing is to know what we have, and once we know it, then we say, ‘Wow. This is worth it.’” 

The Next Generation 

From Emilio’s mission of conserving the forest for his children and grandchildren to Miguel’s dreams of training the next generation of parataxonomists, the future is a constant motivator for the community members working across FUNDAECO’s many programs. 

As for Mayra, she expects to mentor many more girls and women beyond her current class of interns. 

“I would like to continue providing education to rural women, and to make them aware of their rights and empower them,” she says. “It is important to know and care for the environment, because we as future generations have to ensure the right to the environment and our rights as human beings.”

Karen shares similar aspirations for those who, like Mayra, have come up through the Healthy and Empowered Women and Girls Program. “My hope,” says Karen, “is that the young women we have been training and growing in their leadership and empowerment will be the ones who lead the management of protected areas in the medium to long term.” 

In the years to come, FUNDAECO aims to continue expanding the essential activities that have already proven transformative for the communities of Caribbean Guatemala. So far, carbon credits have provided the necessary finance to scale up the project. Karen is optimistic that an increase in carbon market adoption will allow it to scale even further. 

“My dream is that we manage to reach new industries and new buyers so that the project can continue for the next 20 years—and much further,” Karen says.

Because all of FUNDAECO’s remarkable project activities are connected, more carbon credits sold means more scholarships for Guatemalan youth, more health clinics for rural families, more landowners earning income, more hectares of forest conserved, and more birds and amphibians saved from extinction. This wide-ranging impact on community well-being and environmental conservation will continue to flourish in Caribbean Guatemala, from ridge to reef. 

Verra Perspective

Forests are more than carbon sinks. They’re homes, health systems, and livelihoods. Projects like FUNDAECO’s show what’s possible when climate finance uplifts communities and ecosystems together. At Verra, we’re proud to support high-integrity REDD+ projects that deliver lasting impact, on the ground and for the planet.

Susana Vélez Haller

Regional representative, Latin America and the Caribbean

Client Perspective

The standards managed by Verra allow us to highlight the efforts made by developing countries to address climate change. Both the VCS and CCBS Programs provide tools to demonstrate the chain of results we are achieving in terms of biodiversity conservation and benefits for local communities. This shows that tackling deforestation not only contributes to global climate change mitigation, but also generates positive impacts on local development.

Karen Aguilar

REDD+ manager | FUNDAECO