The ninth pillar
The financial engine that sustains the conservation of the Sierra.
Habitat banking, payments for environmental services and friendly economies — the work that makes it possible for forest conservation to also be sustainable over time. It's not one of the foundation's eight original projects, but it sustains several of them.
- Habitat banking
- Payments for environmental services
- Friendly economies
- Publications — Cultivating the Journey
Four pieces, one mechanism
Habitat banking and payments for environmental services are financed-conservation mechanisms — ways for protecting La Tigra Reserve's forest to have real economic backing, not just good will. Friendly economies is the broader umbrella: the business models the foundation drives so that conservation and the local economy reinforce each other, instead of competing. And the editorial work of Cultivating the Journey — published within CUCACO Travel — documents much of this same effort from the storytelling side.
Content pending confirmation with the foundation: specific habitat-banking and PES mechanisms underway, figures and financial partners. Nothing here is invented.
The real base: what already sustains this on the land
A habitat bank isn't built on an idea — it's built on a forest that already exists. This is that forest.
Every habitat-banking or payment-for-environmental-services mechanism needs something concrete to protect. For the foundation, that something is La Tigra Reserve: 13 years of active restoration, documented in its property characterization file and in the land's Environmental Management Plan. These aren't projections — it's what's already happening on the ground.
- Active restoration since2012
- Trees planted14,280
- Native species plantedAt least 35, including caracolí, iguá and guayacán
- Protected water sourcesOrinoco creek (northern boundary) and an internal creek, with riparian planting and water-quality monitoring
- SoilLoamy, with good water retention — suited to natural regeneration and agroforestry
- Active agroforestry systemsCacao, mango, avocado, cashew, coffee and subsistence crops, under agroecological principles
- Wildlife monitoringCamera traps since 2020: ocelot, white-tailed deer, tayra, paca, howler monkeys, opossums, agoutis and various birds
This biophysical base — the soil, the water, the species that already came back — is exactly what a habitat bank certifies and what a payment for environmental services compensates. The difference between having a forest in regeneration and having an active financial mechanism is, above all, a matter of management and partnerships: the forest is already there.
Source: planting figure confirmed by the foundation (14,280 trees), complemented by La Tigra Reserve's property characterization file and Environmental Management Plan for the rest of the biophysical data.
Friendly economies: the channels that already exist
Conservation needs recurring income, not just one-off donations. Several channels already operate within the foundation's own umbrella, moving real money toward the land — each with its own page, and all connected to this same financial logic.
CUCACO Travel
Every traveler who walks the reserve sustains, through their fare, the conservation work and local guides.
Learn about CUCACO TravelLa Local
The showcase where what's created at Casa Feliza and other processes becomes direct income.
Learn about La LocalAgroecological Products
Cacao, coffee and fruit from the same agroforestry systems that protect the reserve's soil.
Learn about the productsThe "Yo Regenero" Seal
“Journeys that awaken ecosystems and hearts.”
A regenerative designation of origin that certifies good human-environmental practices in tourism experiences — a commitment to protecting biodiversity, rebuilding habitats and strengthening culture. Those who carry it implement habitat banks: natural spaces regenerated and protected by tourism itself.
- Who can obtain itReserves, agencies, guides and operators that foster conscious travel; communities weaving regenerative experiences
- StatusComing soon — program launch
- Contactturismoregenerativocolombia@gmail.com
The "Yo Regenero" Seal appears to originate from the "Cultivando el Viaje" collective — a kindred movement, with its own manifesto, that I'm not yet fully clear is a foundation initiative or an external alliance. Worth confirming before presenting it as the foundation's own.
Where this work is anchored
It's not an isolated project.
I'd like to know more about this work
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