An increasing number of women’s groups in rural Costa Rica are involved in tree planting and agroforestry initiatives to combat deforestation and land use changes.

Inter Press Service carries a story about Olga Vargas who works on a forestry program in the north of the country aimed at empowering women and mitigating the effects of climate change.

Through the Quebrada Grande de Pital Women’s Association, Vargas and other women have overcome the challenge of losing the land on which they planted 12,000 trees to work on new projects.

The group helps to maintain the Quebrada Grande forest reserve and has reforested land granted to them. They have also organized environmental protection courses, set up breeding tanks for the sustainable fishing of tilapia and engaged in initiatives in rural tourism and organic agriculture.

According the article, similar women’s associations are springing up throughout rural Costa Rica as a reaction to the failure of local authorities to act on deforestation and land use changes in the face of climate change.

In San Ramón de Turrialba, 65 km east of San José, women are managing a greenhouse which supplies tree seedlings to Costa Rica’s electric company, ICE.

In 1987 Cost Rica’s forest cover was just 21 per cent. Major reforestation efforts have increaed this to 52 per cent and the country is aiming to be the first country in the world to achieve carbon neutrality by 2021.

Women are making a major contribution to forest conservation in Costa Rica which is challenging gender norms. This has only been possible through access to workshops and training and conducive government initiatives in previously male-dominated agroforestry.

Read the full story: Rural Costa Rican Women Plant Trees to Fight Climate Change