Guayakí Yerba Mate - A Powerful Rainforest Experience
About Guayaki Market Driven Restoration
- The Guayaki Story
- BBC WORLD CHALLENGE / GUAYAKI JUNGLE BREW
- Market Driven Restoration
- Rainforest Mate - Cultivation, Harvesting, Processing
- Guayaki Rainforest Projects
- Sustainability
- Biodegradable Packaging
- Reducing Your Carbon Footprint with Guayaki
- Guayaki is fueled by Solar Power
- Guayaki Certifications
- Guayaki Social and Environmental Awards
- The Guayaki Mate Bar
- Team Guayaki
Market Driven Restoration
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THROUGH BRAND BUILDING WE DRIVE REFORESTATION, SUPPORTING LOCAL COMMUNITIES AND THEIR CULTURE |
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Learn about Guayakí's Market-Driven-Restoration |
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With a passion for mate, we have pioneered an innovative business model that directly links our customer’s purchases to our partner farming communities in the South American Atlantic Rainforests. Our partners sustainably harvest organic yerba mate from rainforest grown cultivations and reforestation projects, generating a renewable income stream which enables these communities to improve their lives and restore their lands. Our restoration projects are primarily based in the lush yerba mate growing regions of Argentina, Paraguay and Southern Brazil.
We become intimately involved with our partnering farmers and encourage the cultivation under native rainforest trees. This promotes the preservation of forests, and in addition, we work with the farmers to reforest native hardwood species. Once a farmer agrees to partner with us, we provide technical advice on how to create nurseries, help them manage the organic growing process from cultivation through harvest and then buy what they produce. The farmers, in turn, must repopulate their rain forest with the native hardwood trees -- which restores the land to its original shaded, biodiverse state -- and provides a living wage and fair working conditions.
Looking at the map of the upper Parana forest, one of the ecoregions of the Atlantic Forest, shows the rampant, recent deforestation (95% of the Atlantic Forest has been deforested). Now, with a proven market for rainforest-grown yerba mate, we can begin to reforest this ecoregion with native, diverse mate forests. Yerba Mate is native to the Atlantic forest and forest grown mate is environmentally sustainable in the long term and provides for more income per acre than cattle or agricultural products such as corn, soy or wheat. It will take some time, but as consumers vote with their dollars, we funnel the dollars where they need to go: to the people who are stewarding their forests.
From the simple love of a beverage, Guayakí drinkers have become a driving force for conservation and community development by paying a fair trade price for their yerba mate.
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Guayakí’s MARKET DRIVEN RESTORATION business model directly links our customer’s purchases to our partner farming communities in the South American Atlantic Rainforests. Guayakí’s partners sustainably harvest organic yerba mate in the rainforest, generating a renewable income stream which enables these communities to improve their lives and restore their lands. Guayakí grown yerba mate provides an alternative to destructive practices like logging, cattle grazing and monocropping. Our sustainable model allows income to be generated "from the forest" by keeping the forest intact. Farmers are incentivized to protect native trees, while growing mate. Hardwood seeds collected. This nursery has over 50 native hardwood species. The hardwood saplings are planted around the mate for shade ,to increase biodiversity,to reduce CO2, and for future generations. Hardwood trees shade the yerba mate from the strong sun, and help build healthier soil. Healthy Yerba Mate leaves in the forest. Guayakí Mate is harvested by hand, by workers who are paid a living wage. Guayakí is Fair Trade certified by IMO. The leaves are quickly transported to the drying facility, where it is dried, milled, aged. The drying machine, called a ‘sopecadora’ removes moisture from the leaves and protects the antioxidants. Milled mate, is weighed, then sealed. Similar to wine production, aging allows the yerba mate to mellow, and the flavor to develop character. You learn about the magical energy of Guayakí Yerba Mate, and make a purchase, fueling the healthy cycle of Market Driven Restoration. |
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