Indigenous Efforts Help Restore Guatemala's Totonicapán Forest

Originally published on WORLD WILDLIFE MAGAZINE

Guatemala’s old-growth Totonicapán Forest protects—among other things—ocelots, armadillos, and freshwater springs. But illegal logging, plant disease, and fires threaten the forest and the Indigenous Maya K’iche people who rely on it for their daily needs. Since 2021, WWF’s Russell E. Train Education for Nature (EFN) Program has sponsored EcoLogic Development Fund, a nonprofit that supports Indigenous efforts to restore the forest. During EFN’s 30th anniversary celebrations, EcoLogic and Maya K’iche partners welcomed EFN alumni to see and learn from their process.

EFN alumni examine dried pine cones. Every November, EcoLogic and community volunteers gather cones from the forest. Each can yield more than 50 seeds.

Seeds are planted in soil inoculated with mycorrhizal fungi from the forest, which form a protective symbiotic relationship with the plants’ roots, providing disease resistance and tolerance to external stress.

Fertilizer made by fermenting locally gathered corn, bananas, and horse manure also helps acclimate the seedlings to the local ecosystem

EcoLogic Program Officer and EFN alumnus Mario Ardany de Léon oversees tens of thousands of native cypresses, pines, firs, and alders each year.

Volunteers plant the seedlings from June to September. In 2023 and 2024, EcoLogic and community members restored 620 acres.