Mossy Earth, Coral Insurance to Finance Coral Restoration, Eco Film Short, “Eve”

CLIMATE CHAMPIONS, MOSSY EARTH

The folks at MOSSY EARTH share a passion for the outdoors and the preservation of our natural world. As such they work with one mission in mind, to restore wild ecosystems, support wildlife and biodiversity and help fight climate change. Duarte de Zoeten founded Mossy Earth, as a social enterprise fighting climate change through rewilding and reforestation.  

Mossy Earth is funded through the Mossy Earth membership. Membership is also its approach to getting things done that need to be done on the planet. Its membership strives to make it a fun and interactive experience for everybody. Interested? Membership starts at under $7/month.Their website touts signing up in under a minute. Then monthly, ME plants native trees and works on its rewilding projects, all the while, thanks to your account, each member can track their impact via mobile devices or the web. 

Mossy Earth supports almost 40 projects in the UK, Slovakia, Romania, Spain, Equatorial Guinea and South Africa. Some of those projects include rewilding a former mining site in northwestern Portugal, building a kelp nursery off the coast of Portugal—in conjunction with SeaForester, and reforesting Iceland! 

Iceland is known for its vast open landscapes shaped by massive volcanos and expansive glaciers. Native birchwoods, the only woodland type to form in Iceland, are also an important part of the landscape. They offer food and shelter for biodiversity, help stabilize soil, provide wind breaks, and sequester carbon. 

At one point, it is thought that 25-40% of Iceland was covered in birchwoods. Now, it is a mere 1.5%. This project, in partnership with the Iceland Forest Service, aims to restore birchwoods to an area about 120km east of Reykjavik where natural succession could take centuries or even millennia. So far Mossy Earth has planted over 60,000 trees in Iceland.

DEEPER DIVE: MOSSY EARTH, Reforesting Iceland

EXCELLENT ECO FILM SHORT, “EVE”

Eve is the intimate story of a nine-year-old girl living in one of the oldest off-grid communities in the UK, Tinkers Bubble in Somerset. We follow the fledging climate activist as she navigates her way back into traditional schooling and proudly speaks up for her passionate belief in the environment. Filmmakers Joya Berrow and Lucy Jane discuss their carbon-conscious approach to making their documentary about Eve and her community.

The film was made with the support of the BFI Doc Society Fund and the Climate Story Labs. The filmmakers, Joya Berrow and Lucy Jane, set out with the clear objective of making the entire production carbon conscious. The Tinkers Bubble community is committed to living fossil-fuel free and has been beyond carbon neutral for 25 years. We find out more about its approach to sustainable filmmaking and the lessons learned along the way.

The story focuses on Eve and her family who had just moved into the Tinkers Bubble community. They’re still adjusting to their new, more slowly paced way of living and are ironing out challenges of living in a community.  Why does “Eve” matter to us? Two ways. First it exposes us to a community committed to living fossil-fuel free and has been beyond carbon neutral for 25 years.  Second, for media producers, witnessing the end result of making a carbon neutral film provides a very significant lesson. The filmmakers learned all about how a sustainable approach can be taken by mitigating the impact of production from the seed of the idea. Berrow and Jane realized the heavy consideration required both in budget and schedule, and recognized that a consciousness and patience was needed. 

Maybe this is just what the filmmaking world needs.

DEEPER DIVE: The Guardian

CORAL INSURANCE TO FINANCE CORAL RESTORATION?!

According to Reuters, The Nature Conservancy’s global ‘Reef Brigades’ plan came closer to reality when it bought an insurance policy on behalf of the state of Hawaii, the first U.S. coral insurance contract, which will provide funds for repair work, building on similar policies taken out in the Caribbean. 

Eric Roberts, a senior risk and resilience program manager at The Nature Conservancy (TNC), said. “To date, conservation has really relied on philanthropy and government grants. By using insurance, we’re also tapping into the private sector for this work.” The idea of insuring reefs was first tested three years ago by the Mexican state of Quintana Roo.

Just offshore from some of the country’s most famous Mayan ruins, local tourism businesses and the government bought an insurance policy to cover their share of the Mesoamerican Reef. Environmental group the MAR Fund later took out a policy on the rest of the Mesoamerican Reef, including elsewhere in Mexico, Belize, Guatemala and Honduras. The policies paid out for one storm in Mexico in 2020 and another in Belize this November. Quintana Roo paid 6 million Mexican pesos ($307,850) to renew its policy last July.

Secretary of Ecology and Environment Josefina Huguette Hernández Gómez said it was worth it, “Yes, it can be a lot of money, The cost is higher when you have the loss of biodiversity or corals than what you pay in insurance,” she said. For the premium of $110,000 in Hawaii’s contract, that state will get up to $2 million of insurance protection for its coral reefs until the end of December 2023. The policy covers the majority of Hawaii, from the Big Island to Kauai, and begins paying out at 50 knots of wind.

Why does coral reef insurance matter to us? Patricia Espinosa, a Mexican diplomat and the former head of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change said, “If we don’t address the climate crisis, we will really have a total disaster that will be felt in each and every sector.”

DEEPER DIVE: Reuters