About Our Work
Discover real-world stories of communities overcoming poverty and deforestation! Plant With Purpose, a Christian non-profit, shares examples of environmental sustainability and stewardship from all around the world. These stories show us how faith, resilience, and sustainable practices transform people’s lives as well as their environment. As rural families overcome poverty and heal the planet, embrace empowerment, renewal, and hope.
About Our Work, Haiti, Mexico, Thailand
Before and after the A-Frame: The power of a remarkable tool
This instrument, being used in the Democratic Republic of Congo, is an important tool in Plant With Purpose's mission to restore rural ecosystems. It is called an A-frame. The tool itself is simple, easy to construct, and inexpensive, making it ideal for the settings where Purpose Groups operate.
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About Our Work
Loaves, Fish, and the Power of Collaboration
When I was hired nearly 33 years ago, I knew relatively little about community development, reforestation, or nonprofit management. I had little cross-cultural experience and had spent one unfortunate summer working on a farm in Oregon. However, my time as a Navy officer taught me how to work as a part of a team and how to rely on others with more detailed technical knowledge than my own. I knew that my skills alone were not enough to sustain our work—I needed to collaborate with other experts...
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About Our Work, Burundi
In Mutsindozi, Transformed Communities are Transforming Watersheds
The Mutsindozi watershed is one of twelve watersheds where Plant With Purpose Burundi works. Mutsindozi is uniquely located at the base of two mountain ranges: the Inanzerwe on one side and the Kibimbi on the other. This steep terrain leads to serious environmental threats, including deforestation for wood and charcoal, over-grazing and wandering livestock, bush fires, erosion, depleted water sources, soil degradation, and floods which destroy the banks of the Mutsindozi River...
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About Our Work
The Purpose Plan: How Collaboration Shapes Our Strategy
At Plant With Purpose, we believe growth doesn’t happen in isolation—it’s cultivated through collaboration, vision, and shared purpose. This year, we embarked on one of our most exciting organizational journeys yet: creating a new three-year rolling strategic framework, which we call the FY 2026–2028 Purpose Plan...
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About Our Work
Collaboration Across Continents: The Global Team Behind Every Planted Tree
Collaboration is a core value of Plant With Purpose, and is deeply embedded in how we operate at every level. The deep collaboration between our local staff and partnering farmers is at the forefront of our daily impact, and is essential to our growth across 71 watersheds in nine countries. Through collaboration between Plant With Purpose staff, partnering farmers, watershed communities, like-minded NGOs, and funding foundations, lives and land are actively being restored every day...
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About Our Work, DR Congo, Tanzania, Thailand
Local Innovations Build Resilience: How Plant With Purpose Supports Communities to Thrive
Outside aid arriving to “fix” a community’s problems can often do more harm in the long run. Lasting change doesn’t come from handouts. It comes when barriers are removed and communities are empowered to build resilience and create their own solutions. At Plant With Purpose, our model is not designed to just offer help. It […]
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About Our Work, Environmental Restoration
Change Belongs in Local Hands
At Plant With Purpose, we believe the future belongs to local communities. That’s why we don’t see people as projects, but as partners. Every Purpose Group writes its own bylaws. Every leader is elected by the members, who are also their neighbors. Every farmer is both a student and a teacher. Because when change is […]
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About Our Work
Three Ways Plant With Purpose Practices Partners Not Projects
At Plant With Purpose, one of our most important commitments is to treat the communities we work alongside not as projects to be fixed, but as partners in transformation. We call this approach Partners Not Projects. This principle is not just a slogan. It is a foundational practice that shapes the way we restore watersheds, […]
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About Our Work, Burundi, DR Congo, Haiti
Abundance is more than wealth
In the world of international development, economic indicators often dominate the conversation. How much has household income increased? How many small businesses were launched? These metrics are important, but they’re only part of the story. What about trust between neighbors? Spiritual renewal? The return of birds and pollinators to a once-barren field? Or a parent […]
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About Our Work, Our Response
Rethinking Empowerment: What We Mean When We Say It, and Why It Matters
Empowerment is one of those words that frequently appears in conversations about global development. At Plant With Purpose, it’s a core value. It's central to how we approach our mission and how we describe the way we approach our work. But we also recognize that it can be a complex term. We believe that the […]
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About Our Work, Sustainability
Theology in Action: How Faith Shapes Sustainability
At its core, Christian environmentalism is about transformation—of hearts, habits, and habitats; theology in action. Faith-based environmental organizations, such as Plant With Purpose, operate on the belief that the ecological crisis facing our world is deeply tied to spiritual brokenness. Restoring the land goes hand in hand with restoring our relationship with God and with […]
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About Our Work, Environmental Restoration
What Christian Environmentalists Need to Know About Agroforestry
Agroforestry aka forest farming—the integration of trees into agricultural landscapes—has emerged as one of the most effective strategies for both environmental restoration and poverty alleviation. It isn’t just a new agricultural trend. It’s a transformative practice that empowers communities to break free from cycles of poverty while caring for the land they depend on. For […]
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About Our Work
The Role of Agroforestry in Reducing Poverty and Boosting Livelihoods
When Andres first stepped onto his hillside farm in the Dominican Republic, he was facing more than just a struggling crop—he was facing the reality of a life trapped in poverty. His coffee plants, once the backbone of his livelihood, had been devastated by disease. With few alternatives and seven children to feed, his future […]
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About Our Work
Why Do We Plant Trees?
Farmers who partner with Plant With Purpose have planted 76.6 million trees to date, and are projected to plant another 11 million in fiscal year 2026! But tree planting hasn’t always been our goal. When our CEO Scott Sabin first joined Plant With Purpose as an intern in 1993, he wasn’t particularly interested in planting trees. In fact, tree planting seemed like a distraction from the “real” mission of reducing rural poverty. Today, people new to Plant With Purpose may also wonder: what is the connection between helping people thrive and planting trees? The answer lies in the unique geographies of the watersheds we work in, where trees and livelihoods are inextricably intertwined.
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About Our Work, Dominican Republic, Haiti
Building Roads, Building Futures
The deeper meaning behind road building initiatives in rural Haiti Plant With Purpose focuses its efforts on rural communities. This is because rural communities are at the crossroads of poverty and climate change, but also because they have tremendous potential to drive change. These communities often face significant challenges such as poverty, food insecurity, and […]
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