Catalytic Finance

Brazil is home to 60 percent of the Amazon Basin, home to nearly 10 percent of the earth’s biodiversity and 16 percent of its freshwater. But over the last 50 years, Brazil’s Amazon has lost about a fifth of its forest cover to deforestation, in part due to cattle ranching.

Since 2023, The Rockefeller Foundation has been proud to support Mombak’s efforts with their network of unlikely partners. So how does it work? Once Mombak partners with landowners, they supply the seedlings, employees, and land managers necessary for reforestation. Through data analysis of land parcels, Mombak calculates the carbon removal potential of each project and sells high-quality carbon removal credits to companies that want to offset their residual emissions.

Landowners receive a percentage of the revenue from those sales, creating a new and passive revenue stream that can be three to five times greater per hectare than their revenue from cattle ranching.

To date, Mombak’s reforestation efforts have created as many as seven times more jobs than existing cattle ranching operations, providing above-average wages and benefits like healthcare and vacation for people like Ms. Silva.

“It is an honor to be a part of something that is not just business,” said Ms. Silva. “It’s a part of the future of our children and our grandchildren.”

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