This episode features a conversation between Phil Dillard, Founder of Thruline Networks, and Louis Lagoutte, Branch Manager at One Tree Planted, a non-profit working worldwide to plant trees, restore ecosystems, protect biodiversity and create sustainable economic opportunities. A graduate of United World College and Jacobs University Bremen, Louis’ interests involve environmental sustainability and the discourse that ensues, exploring difficult questions around the trade offs needed to make the vital changes much needed in our world. He's passionate about rewilding and views tree planting as the solution to many of humanity's problems. In his current role, Louis builds strategic partnerships from the private sector to enable impact and scale up critical work helping plant trees all over the globe. In this episode, Louis talks about defining impact within the non-profit sector, planting trees as a means to an end, and how one can individually contribute towards a better future.
This episode features a conversation between Phil Dillard, Founder of Thruline Networks, and Louis Lagoutte, Branch Manager at One Tree Planted, a non-profit working worldwide to plant trees, restore ecosystems, protect biodiversity and create sustainable economic opportunities.
A graduate of United World College and Jacobs University Bremen, Louis’ interests involve environmental sustainability and the discourse that ensues, exploring difficult questions around the trade offs needed to make the vital changes much needed in our world. He's passionate about rewilding and views tree planting as the solution to many of humanity's problems. In his current role, Louis builds strategic partnerships from the private sector to enable impact and scale up critical work helping plant trees all over the globe.
In this episode, Louis talks about defining impact within the non-profit sector, planting trees as a means to an end, and how one can individually contribute towards a better future.
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Guest Quote
“Planting trees is a means to an end. It's not the goal of the project itself. We're planting trees in order to, for example, restore the wildlife corridor. We're planting trees in order to diversify the incomes of smallholder farmers, prevent soil erosion on their lands, and help their other crops. We're planting trees to prevent flooding. So, planting trees as a means to an end. And that is looking at the ecosystem, planting the right trees in the right place, involving the communities, and also planting trees where there's meant to be. Some places are meant to be forests, and that's where we want to do restoration. But some places are also meant to be wetlands. Some places are meant to be grasslands, and we understand that what we are doing is one piece of the puzzle of a very complex, multifaceted puzzle, which is all of the work and restoration which we need to do on our planet.” - Louis Lagoutte
Episode Timestamps
(02:18) Louis’ current role
(09:44) Getting involved in One Tree Planted
(15:52) Defining impact within the organization
(21:54) One Tree Planted as a non-profit
(29:50) Longitudinal data on the impact of projects
(34:30) Why people choose One Tree Planted
(37:08) Quick hit questions
Links
Phil Dillard: Hello and welcome to Thruline to the 4th Sector where we're exploring fourth sector capitalism and impact investing as an invitation to innovation and changing the world. This episode features a conversation between Phil Dillard, Founder of Thruline Networks and Louis Lagoutte, Branch Manager at One Tree Planted, a nonprofit working worldwide to plant trees, restore ecosystems, protect biodiversity, and create sustainable economic opportunities.
A graduate of the United World College and Jacobs University Breman, Louis' interests include environmental sustainability and the discourse that ensues in exploring difficult questions around the trade-offs needed to make vital changes much needed in our world. He's passionate about rewilding and views tree planting as a solution to many of humanity's problems. In his current role, Louis builds strategic partnerships from the private sector to enable impact and scale up the critical work, helping plant trees all over the globe. In this episode, Phil and Louis talk about the defining impact within the nonprofit sector, planting trees as a means to the end in reforestation and rewilding critical areas of the planet, and how one can individually contribute towards a better future. Now, please enjoy this interview between Phil Dillard and Louis Lagoutte.
Hello everybody and welcome again to another episode of Thruline to the 4th Sector. I'm your host, Phil Dillard, here today with Louis Lagoutte from One Tree Planted. How are you doing today, Louis?
[00:01:41] Louis Lagoutte: Very well, thank you. Thanks, uh, for having me, Phil. I'm looking forward to our
[00:01:43] Phil Dillard: conversation today. I am too. Very much. Thanks for making the time. Gosh. You know, maybe I'll just jump right into it because there's so much to cover and that we're really excited to, to have you learn about you, your journey and the, the organizations. You know, we, we do these conversations in three parts.
First, we talked about you and your background, just getting to know you a little bit and then. Talking a little bit about what changed you and brought you into this space and why you are where you are, and then, you know, we talk a little bit about what's going on in the organization and what you see as real big opportunities and, and what are some of the challenges.
So maybe we'll just get started and jump right into it when people ask you. What you do, how do you describe what you do? It's a very good
[00:02:26] Louis Lagoutte: question because, um, you know, organizations, they do so many complex things, but my short answer is, um, I help to plant trees. So I don't plant trees myself. But, you know, as an organization, that is our goal.
It's really helping to plant trees and helping to restore some of our planet's ecosystems. And
[00:02:43] Phil Dillard: I want to get into a lot more. What that all really means cuz um, you know, we dig into that really deep in the work that we do and I appreciate how in the marketing of the organization, you guys simplify the message and make it really easy for people to understand the basics.
But, uh, uh, there's a lot more to it than planting trees. But how did you get involved in this field and how did you get started in this?
[00:03:07] Louis Lagoutte: So I actually come from quite a different background. Um, you know, I didn't study forestry, I didn't study ecology or anything like that. I studied, um, social sciences, so politics, international relations, economics.
And then I found myself after university in Ecuador and South America working for a small social enterprise as a kind of gap year, um, adventure. And in the small social enterprise, we were working with small holder farmers. Who are producing, uh, a kind of herbal tea. And our, our goal was to empower these smallholder farmers, make this tea more known all over the world.
Cause it was a healthy source of energy. And then while we were doing this, I thought there's a lot of potential here for planting native tree species, mixing that in with what the farmers are doing, so agro forestry, uh, models. And so we thought, well, we'll look for a little bit of funding to, to see if we can get some funding to do a planting project.
And so we reached out to many different organizations and none of them gave us the time of day because we were very small. It was a tiny budget, tiny project. But then I reached out to, um, someone called Matt Hill who just started a, a nonprofit called One Tree Planted, and he said, that sounds great. You know, we'd love to support it, love to be involved.
[00:04:20] Phil Dillard: Yeah. And there
[00:04:21] Louis Lagoutte: you go. And there we go. And then, so we, we did this small project and then I said to Matt, at that point, it was just Matt who was running, once we planted, and I said, I'd love to get involved. Let me know when, when I can come and, and help the mission. Because there was just something very attractive about the simplicity of the goal and also, Just being in a position where you can help organization from the ground and people on the ground to do good work.
It's real privilege to have that, that,
[00:04:46] Phil Dillard: that opportunity. And what is it, do you feel like that changed? I mean, lots of people do things around, you know, a social enterprise or a gap year or they, you know, help a, a village or a, you know, some sort of projects, but there's something that had to have been bigger in that for you.
Was there anything in particular that really moved you around this project that clicked for you? That's really
[00:05:07] Louis Lagoutte: important to you. I think there's been a few times through throughout my life, which have really led me to feel more and more connected to the ecosystem around us. And to become, to see myself less as separate to it and more kind of as, as a part of it, which is, um, currently harming the rest.
And so, Part of that started out actually when I went, I, I went to a kind of slightly alternative two year school in, uh, New Mexico from the age of 16 to 18. And we were in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains and I had a great environmental science teacher and we used to just go and do environmental science classes walking through the woods and just being aware of.
Everything at a kind of systems level. And I think systems level thinking is, is really useful in these problems. And so I was looking at, you know, how is the water flowing through the system? How is carbon and nitrogen and nutrients? And just pointing out, you know, looking at the macro picture but then also looking at the micro picture, you know, whether it's ants and you know, just the ecosystem just under the base of a tree.
That really made me feel very connected to nature. And then I grew up in the countryside. I grew up on a farm in the South France. And I've always felt like there's a, there's an immense kind of natural heritage being lost, and that to me is, is a great sadness. And it's really only in kind of mid twenties, you know, into late twenties, that I've realized, okay, what I would really love to do if, if I was to leave a mark on Earth, it would be.
Help nature to kind of repair itself or create space for biodiversity.
[00:06:43] Phil Dillard: Yeah. Okay. That makes a lot of sense. I love the part where you, the quote here, you know, there's a great natural heritage being lost, right? Uh, we see this in different parts of the world. Uh, where traditional ways of doing things go away.
Whether you're subsistence farmer, kelp farmer in the Philippines, or whether you're used to foraging in the forest for your food in different parts of the world, and on and on and on. Certain changes because of the growth and industrialization and, and. The growth of cities and such have, have, have changed that and have, uh, lots of people talk about this being disconnected from the, from the earth and from nature.
So from the farm to a very different place in the US to Ecuador. You know, something was sparked in you that says, you know, not only can I do something about this, but I really wanna, wanna do something about this for the, for the planet for. For the economics and for the beauty and the legacy. I love that.
The great natural heritage.
[00:07:43] Narrator: In order to get more insight on this topic, we reached out to Janice Fraiser, an author, public speaker, and leading advisor to innovation executives and startup founders. Here's what she had to say.
[00:07:55] Janice Fraiser: It's people minded, but it's also not people. People would say, I want all the comforts. People would say it's easier to ignore all of this, so we've gotta like go past the money, past people to what is gonna actually enable this place to continue. We cannot continue extracting in order to be comfort. How do you get a bunch of humans, 8 billion humans, to give up their own personal comfort? It's a pretty tough challenge.
[00:08:26] Narrator: Now, back to the interview with Louis Lagoutte from One Tree Planted.
[00:08:32] Louis Lagoutte: Yeah, absolutely. I do feel like sometimes in these discourses and discussions, I feel like we, people don't wanna sound like they're moralizing, which is understandable. Nobody wanna sound, but I do think there's a moral imperative, which we have as kind of a part of creation, of intelligent life to help all of the rest of, of this kind of life on our planet.
And so, yeah, absolutely is. These experiences have shaped how I think about it. Also show me very diverse places around the world, places where, you know, everything has, for example, in, you know, the UK as well, where I lived, you know, the landscapes have been farmed intensively for hundreds and hundreds of years.
There's no. There's no wilderness left, there's no large mammals left. And then going to places which are still, for example, when I was living in, in New Mexico where you still have wilderness, and I thought, wow, there's, there's bears in, there's links, there's deer everywhere. There's, this is what it was like before it, it really helped me to realize what
[00:09:25] Phil Dillard: had been lost.
Right. Or at least it was something like what was before. I mean, I had that experience. I had that experience in different parts of the, the US where I saw wildlife, but then when I went to the Amazon, my first trip to the Amazon, Over 20 years ago. So it was a a lot different and a lot more lush and green, but the amount of wildlife, right?
Or going on a safari in Africa to see the Big five and, and everything else was there. Or diving on the barrier reef, all those ecosystems I know. Are diminished from when I saw them the first time. And that the legacy of having generations after us being able to see giraffes in the wild, for example, or a lush barrier reef diving on, on coral reefs, that is something that, um, humanity should not.
Lose for losing the sake of the forest for the trees, right? We need to help the natural world coexist with us in our somewhat loss of connection with the natural world. It's really hard to understand sometimes when you hear it abstract. But I think you put a really good face on it from your actual personal experience.
So when you left, you know, Ecuador, you started jumping into one tree, planted, what expertise do you feel like you had kind of professionally from your education, and what sort of expertise do you feel like you had from your background and from your areas of passion and your practical education that you think might have brought you to being successful in the position you're in?
Right. Well,
[00:10:52] Louis Lagoutte: I definitely learned Ecuador was a perspective from what it's like on the ground and sometimes these conversations around conservation ecosystems can ignore the people on the ground or talk about as if they don't exist. So it's very useful to have that background working with smallholder farmers, with cooperative farmers to understand that if you wanna have successful.
Restoration conservation in these places. You need to have, you need to include those people first and foremost as the principal agents of change. It was good to have that, that side from of, and then I'd also had done, done a bit of business, I'd worked at Diamond Mercedes just for like, you know, seven, eight months.
Between two years of university. But that was interesting to see a bit of the business case, their interests and where do the interests converge. But I definitely lacked a lot of kind of expertise from the ecological center forestry sense. But that was the great thing about, um, being in kind of a growing team and in a growing organization with that, we were really all learning together and bringing in some really fantastic people.
One of the best things about this experience is really learning from my colleagues, learning from people, and I think it's such an asset to have people who, who love to share what they do and share their knowledge. Sure.
[00:12:07] Phil Dillard: Two questions that pop there. Why is a small farm holder, small farmer, important? It
[00:12:13] Louis Lagoutte: depends.
So the restoration, especially in the kind of, you know, global south and, you know, that's, that's a problematic phrase. The majority of a lot, a lot of people are still subsistence farmers. So when you're looking at restoration in these lands, one has to recognize that it's not, like, for example, the conservation in the US where, you know, you have huge air of the federal land in these places.
A lot of people make their living off the land and they have to make very difficult choices. They have to decide a kid, you know, do they wanna feed their, you know, to make a very, you know, crude, but you know, probably accurate sometimes. Do they wanna cut down these trees and send their kids to school or do they not?
I notice, see, these things are much more complex, but that's why it's very important. Agriculture is kind of the basis of our, of our civilization as well, right? Agriculture is, you know, when we stopped being hunter gatherers and we settled in one place and we. Growing food ourselves, that that civilization begun to flourish.
And I think it's still kind of, uh, the basis of most of our, um, systems, you know, ecological systems and then also, um, societal and, and economic systems. So I feel like it's kind of the base of the pyramid because it's what makes up the majority of land use and in many countries it's what employs the majority of the workforce.
So that's why it's very important to.
[00:13:23] Phil Dillard: Yeah, and I think it's important that you share that. Thank you very much. Because I don't think a lot of people in the more developed nations really think about it that way. They think about a farm, they picture some guy in Iowa on a tractor, you know, doing mono crops, you know, harvesting corn, and then somebody else down the road harvesting soybeans and never think about the fact.
Most farmers in the world are families who've been living on this land for generation and been doing some sort of approach that they've used, something, maybe they've modified, but it's not this monoculture, highly mechanized sort of corporate farming. The connection with the land really matters to the people.
And I think the other thing is, you know, as they look at the projects of One Tree Planted, agriculture is an entry. That makes it easy for people to understand, understanding mangrove restoration or wildlife corridors or carbon sequestration through agro forestry and rehabilitation of wild spaces.
That's a lot more complex for people to grab their minds around, but I think the organization does a really good job of talking about the basics. Of agriculture so you can connect with somebody and you go, I see how that's going to be helpful. I can take part in this, and then you can kind of build from there.
Do you think that it was something that's kind of intentional in this early strategy of One Tree planted or is it something that kind of evolved over time?
[00:14:45] Louis Lagoutte: I think so. So Matt, who's the founder of Onetree Planted, is won many different hats Through his career. He's kind of had finance, but then most recently before he launched one Planted, he was marketing and he was a marketing professor actually.
So storytelling was always very important. Storytelling, building a brand that people felt kind of connected to was. From the beginning, a core part of, of all of our goals. I think centering the people on the ground is really important, and as an organization we do really wanna do that. So it has been quite intentional.
I mean, last year we, you know, planted over 50 million trees, but from our team, you know, we don't have anybody who goes out and spends everyday planting trees. We're, we're working with and funding projects from all of these amazing organizations all over the world. So we're kind of helping them to. Their impact to increase the work they're doing.
And so partnerships and collaboration are really, really critical, especially on a large level to address systems level
[00:15:45] Phil Dillard: problems. Sure. And you can't have the partnerships and collaboration if you don't have a very clear message. About the value proposition that the organization provides, about the mission that it, that it's on, and then the breadth of these different, uh, projects that need to get done.
I know directly from working on sourcing some of these projects for different reasons, that there are a lot of projects that are out there, but it's difficult to make sure you do them in high quality ways and that you deliver the impact that you're shooting for, right? You'd be like, it's great. To plant 50 million trees, but it's not great if 40 million of them die within the first three years for whatever number of reasons.
It's great that there's 50 million, and I don't know what the number is, but if it's that we need 50 billion, we're only getting started into where we need to go. So I use that as a tee-up question to say how do you define impact for the organization, and then how do you define impact in terms of like the partnership, your role in.
[00:16:46] Louis Lagoutte: Yeah, so I mean, first of all, as an organization, so the impact, and we've always said this internally, it's not always about the scale and we've grown a lot, but we've all said internally, maps internally, you said, you know, I'd rather do something small and do it well than do something huge and not do it well.
So, That's something which we really, we really, really take to heart. And when we are looking through the projects, we are really looking at the benefits on the ground, the communities on the ground, the ecosystems, the communities, because you have to bear this all in mind in order to kind of have the economic benefits, which will encourage people that this is maybe.
You know, something which should be continued, for example, agro forestry, that it will help them. What's the ecological benefits? So that's kinda how we measure success. Is it helping communities, helping people at that kind of granular level on the ground. And then, I mean, on a personal level, my role is really the partnerships.
So I talk to a lot of corporates and companies who wanna work with us, so, Part of that for me is obviously, you know, my kind of simple, one dimensional goal is to kind of get funding for our projects. But also I think I, uh, one of my goals, which I have, and something which I feel is a measure of success is helping organizations to maybe see things.
Differently, making them aware of different issues. For example, sometimes thinking beyond carbon, companies come to us a lot. At the moment. Everybody's thinking, okay, we have a carbon footprint. How do we address this? We need to kind of turn the carbon dial down to zero and everything will be fine. And absolutely we have a huge hard problem.
But you know, also, even if we could fix that tomorrow, we'd still have a soil crisis, a biodiversity crisis. We still have pollution crisis, so, so it's. At the whole system, you know, and instead of maybe addressing what are some of the symptoms of the problem, addressing the kind of broader problem itself, which is, you know, our extractive and exploitative relation with the natural world.
Part of my goal is a bit to kind of shift that mentality and, and thinking. To be broadly about kind of impact and benefits.
[00:18:50] Phil Dillard: Oh, that's great. So if I'm hearing you right, I would describe that as, you know, taking the entry point that you can get with a corporation, for example, who's talking about carbon and then extending and expanding the conversations so that they understand it more holistically.
Just like you started with agriculture discussions, but a lot of people say, what's the mangrove? I've heard, what's the mangrove and what does it matter? And. Why do we care and how does this matter to, to anything? I think if you're trying to extend that conversation, you go from somebody thinking about, you know, scope three emissions because of a regulatory scheme or because they're trying to say we're doing something for this un sustainable development goal, but then, More holistically, strategically thinking about how does this fit into their contribution to planetary boundaries?
Right. How does this fit into the, the broader scheme of, of a combination of those different goals, so you could say, so they understand that they need to do business differently in a way that systematically enhances the ability to have sustainable life on the planet. Right. It seems like that's, that's where you're headed.
[00:19:53] Louis Lagoutte: Absolutely. I mean that's exactly what you said. It's really using an entry point to have conversations. And conversations are so important and it's, um, it's always really interesting cuz it's also not just one way, it's not just us saying, oh, you know, you should care about this, you should care about that.
It's also so interesting to hear. You know, from our partners, from the corporate partners, you know, what is, um, driving their action coming from the consumers or increasingly, you know, what is driving their actions coming from the boardroom who are saying, look, we won this. So interesting also to understand their perspective, how the market's moving, because that's a huge force as well, which, you know, I don't necessarily have insight two.
[00:20:30] Phil Dillard: And do you have a feel for like, what's driving corporations more like, my hypothesis is that there is a mix of. Government regulatory, especially if you're in Europe, right? Uh, the fear of regulatory, especially if you're in the us the demands or lack thereof of the consumer. And then, you know, maybe just our own desire to have good business principles.
Right. You know, Ben and Jerry says, for example, Hey, we're gonna operate a certain way cuz this is who we are. But there are very few companies that do that. But I mean, you're seeing a lot of different companies. Are you seeing any trends in that? Yeah.
[00:21:09] Louis Lagoutte: Um, absolutely. I think there is sometimes a difference in between companies where, you know, so a privately owned, for example, family owned companies, we have some kind of very large companies who are family owned, where the family just say, oh, we wanna do this, and then they do it, you know, and they just, oh, you know, one of the.
People in, you know, the family who owns this huge business went on a safari and they want to, you know, help to restore price in Africa. So there, there can be that approach. And then from kind of, you know, large publicly listed companies, boardrooms and with um, boards, it's increasingly the pressure is coming from the consumers.
But now it's actually kind of coming from top down a bit, because, like you said, of these kind of regulatory changes. And also because no one wants to be the last. People know they're not gonna be the first mover if they haven't started already, but no one wants to be the one who appears to be dragging their feet on this.
So that's definitely a trend where I think instead of, I, I before, you know, have conversations about sustainability, teams would be saying, oh, you know, we have these great projects, you know, we'd like to do this and we'd like to do that. And they go to their board and they, they ask for funding and they were always fighting together.
Now the trend is almost reversed whether boards, and, you know, the leadership of these companies are saying, we wanna do more and more. We wanna do this, we wanna do. And these kind of teams are almost overloaded, which is a great problem to have them, they're trying to do so much
[00:22:24] Phil Dillard: at once to have people overloaded working for these, um, for those sort of projects.
That's, that's a, that's a good problem to have. Super. So I'm gonna ask you what might seem like a kind of a crazy question, but I'm curious about how you would answer this question. But why is one tree plant. A nonprofit, why is it not some other type of company?
[00:22:45] Louis Lagoutte: It's a very, very good question. Yeah. Matt, as a founder could probably answer this better than me, but I do know that at the beginning it was not set in stone that we were gonna establish ourselves as a nonprofit.
And even though we are a nonprofit, We do somewhat have what could be seen as a business model in that we do somewhat, almost commodify the impact in that. You know, you have, you donate a dollar and a tree is planted. The vast majority of that goes to fund the project directly off the ground. And then a small percentage of that last year, about 13%.
Covers all of our expenses, which is mostly monitoring and vetting projects. So it is essentially kind of a product and a business model. But I think being so, so at the beginning, there's definitely, uh, there's, I'm not quite sure about how it works in the US but in the UK there's many different models now.
There's kind of a public interest company, community-owned companies, et cetera. But I think being a nonprofit has helped us in some ways to get a foot in the door. It does also, when you are having conversations, Create a sense of trust from the beginning in that when you are talking with potential donors, with people who you know, who you're gonna collaborate with, it doesn't feel like a transactional relationship as much as it would if we were, you know, a company, a for-profit company, and then we would be seen more as a service provider.
And then that changes the dynamic a lot. Also, then you're tailoring the work maybe more based on who's funding it, right? You're providing a service for them rather than saying, this is the work we're doing, these are the partners we have. You know, if you want to donate, it would be wonderful. But if you're saying, if you're providing a service, then it becomes a bit different.
And then people say, oh, well we actually only wanna plant. This type of tree in this place. And we do obviously a lot of custom projects for a lot of our partners, but it does actually give us, I think, a slight kind of independence being a nonprofit as well.
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Yeah, and I think if I remember the model correctly that, you know, you guys do a pretty good job of going direct to consumers to say, support this project. You wanna donate $1, $5, $50, you know, off you go. But it's going to convert to a trees. And then, you know, we looked at the, the website and the, the numbers and your, and the impact reports and we're super selective about nonprofits that we talked to.
And, you know, the, all those numbers look really, really good there. They seem to be really commendable. And there's a, there is a good contribution from individuals, but there's a. Contribution also from the corporates who said, we see it, we get it, and you know, we want to amplify this work. So it, it seemed to be like there was a positioning there that said you are a good, trusted partner for execution of something that the corporation, for whatever reason, wanted to support and wanted to deliver from the, from the grant perspective and then as a partner as well.
Is that pretty fair?
[00:26:42] Louis Lagoutte: Yeah, absolutely. And you know, I think the, the. Focus and the kind of the consumer part somewhat led to the brand growing and then be kind of recognized amongst companies and, and getting funding more from, from corporate. So they've both always been really, really critical. But if you look at kinda how we position ourselves, we are very much about engaging with individuals, making them feel interested, you know, maybe optimistic, um, telling them success stories
[00:27:11] Phil Dillard: as.
Okay. That makes sense. So now pulling on that thread a little bit, there's always people who love some a story and other people who kind of pick at it, right? What would you say your biggest fans say about the organization? And then what would you say, what your biggest skeptics say about the organization?
[00:27:27] Louis Lagoutte: I think our biggest fans probably really like the, I think the scale of the impact. The fact that we're planting trees in over 50 countries. We had 300 projects last year with a range of different impacts. So whether it's mangroves in India where I wasn't on the ground in November, visiting and the benefits that that has, or whether it's wildfire post fire restoration in the west of the US or Agroforestry and in Honduras, it's a real range of impact and I think the simplicity.
Is what people like. You can just donate five bucks. You plant five trees, you send someone an E-card and it says you've planted five trees. For them it's easy, but I think conversely then that is also somewhat, people maybe find to criticize a bit. It's kinda, is it too easy? It's not that simple.
[00:28:14] Phil Dillard: Yeah. I think you have to dig under the hood to, to figure that out because I mean, that's honestly like my first skepticism.
I'm like, ah, they say they're planting trees. What does that really mean? Because some places it really does just mean they're pla. I mean, I saw these guys who were building drones. They were like, Hey, tree planting drones. And I was like, well, what about the rest of it? And they're like, Plants the trees, you know, that they had a simplistic, uh, perspective.
And I, and I think digging underneath it, I realize that you guys don't, I mean, you have a seem to be picking some of the really thoughtful partners to, to doing it, doing the work and the, to communicating that work kind of really, really, really, really well. So I think that was interesting. Um, where do you think the skeptics have encouraged you guys to be better?
[00:28:57] Louis Lagoutte: Yeah. Um, that's a very good question and I think scrutiny. Is good always, and I think if you're confident in the work you do, you would never shy away from scrutiny. When we started out, obviously we were very small and we didn't have the resources that some of our, you know, really, really large organizations have, you know, your kind of TNCs and WWF and Rainforest Alliance, et cetera.
We really, um, learned more and then we, we brought team, but I think what we've. Really better at is the monitoring side of things, which this year is a kind of a big year for monitoring. So we hired this year, uh, movement end of last year, Bruce Robertson, and she literally read a book, the, the book on kind of ecological restoration using things like satellites, drone lapping, all of these kind of emerging technologies to monitor the health of the projects.
Also, tree planting kind of came to the fore and it. Everybody was really overexcited about it. And there was so many companies popping up. Maybe one could say if cynically, you know, slightly opportunistically, um, you know, for profit companies say, we'll plant a tree. Oh. And it was almost a bit of a race to the bottom being like, we'll do it for this amount, we'll do it for that amount, getting lower and lower.
But since then, there has been a kind of a. I wouldn't say a backlash, but more a, an inquiry into what it means here in media and people, articles, writing about it, reading about it. There's been some projects which have been called out right, for not, for not doing the right thing. So, I mean, from the beginning we've had a very clear approach.
And what we found, and, you know, we're, we're not looking to, I mean, what I, what I say is, Um, you know, planting trees as a means to an end, it's not the goal of the project itself. We're planting trees in order to, for example, restore a wildlife corridor. This ecosystem, we're planting trees in order to diversify the incomes of smallholder farmers, prevent soil erosion on their lands and, you know, help their other crops.
We're planting trees to, you know, maybe prevent flooding or so planting trees as a means to an end. And that is looking at the ecosystem, planting the right trees in the right place, involving the communities, and also planting trees where there's meant to be trees. Some places are meant to be forests, and that's where we want to do restoration.
But some places are also meant to be wetlands. Some places are meant to be grassland, and we understand that what we are doing is one piece of the puzzle of a very complex, multifaceted puzzle, which is all of the work and restoration, which we need to do on our.
[00:31:18] Phil Dillard: No, it makes a ton of sense. Makes a ton of sense.
I definitely want to take a look at Reese Robinson in the book that you've talked about. We'll have to put a, a link to it in the, in the show show notes because I made think you guys are very good at being transparent in the organization. There's good, transparent data about the funding and the financing and the, and the sponsors and that sort of stuff, and the impact.
And it's clear that you're starting to do more on, on the reporting. Do you have any. Longitudinal data on the impact of projects, is that something that you're asking more of from the project sponsors to give you more, more data? Like how much, far do you feel like you have to go in the impact measurement
[00:31:54] Louis Lagoutte: story?
So we definitely at the kind of, at the beginning, Of the journey when it comes to monitoring, especially the, the very long term impacts, I think pre-planting and post planting, it's, it's relatively straightforward to just see, you know, how many saplings have survived after a year or two years or three years.
Because, you know, you take these kind of sample plots and you can analyze each tree and extrapolate from that, but down the line, I'm very excited actually, really to, to feed down the line what it looks like, you know, in 15 years. You know what, there's a landscape that has been restored in 15 years look like, and also the results can come about quite quickly.
I was in India, like I said, mangrove project, and there was a site in which where we'd funded, um, a mangrove restoration. Project three years ago, and we had a drone fly over when the planting was taking place, and then three years later and it was a forest. I mean, it's an exceptional place where, you know, it's with, due to the climate and the temperature and water, everything grows very quickly.
But it was really remarkable to see that. But longitudinally, you know, there have to be metrics more than just, you know, the trees surviving. You have to look at is the ecosystem thriving? Is the community thriving? Is there employment? And that's why the monitoring is about much more than just trees. It's about.
Of the ecosystem and the health of that community.
[00:33:05] Phil Dillard: And can you talk a little bit about how you guys know whether or not a project is a good project, whether or not a project is working early on and, and what's that mean when you know, somebody says, I, I contribute a hundred dollars to this location. Is is it, you know, I know there's more than just planting the trees cuz there's all this sort of stuff that that happens.
So how do you know what's working and communicate that to what's an increasingly savvy. Donor base who's asking like more and more questions of what's happened next?
[00:33:35] Louis Lagoutte: Yeah. Good question because people are, uh, very curious. People ask all of the right questions. Yeah. Communicating the impacts comes from, from storytelling.
It comes from a lot of what we do when the projects come in is we look at who are the organizations who are carrying this app, who we're working with on the ground. And for example, in the US we work with the United States Forest Service. We work with a lot of local. You know, so we work with this kind of huge, kinda federal organization and we also work with some watersheds, for example, a watershed group or coalition of watersheds in the Pacific Northwest.
So who is the organization doing it and what is the plan that they want to do? Who owns the land? What are the guarantees for that land being preserved, not being developed? What is the mix of species? Are they native? Making sure that it's not to be exploited. It's not a commercial plantation. It's not tree planting is not creating forests, it's creating plantations and the two very different things.
So yeah, really looking. Zeroing in on that. Zeroing in on also, there's a whole value chain to, to planting a tree because we're not planting a seed. You know, you mentioned drones, you know, dropping seeds. That's, you know, we're not planting a seed, we're planting a sampling. And so in order to get a sampling, you have to, you have to collect seeds, you have to, um, you know, germinate the SAPs.
You have to keep them in the nursery. So, A workforce involved. So it's looking at how are those people, are they being paid fair wages, who's in a part of that labor force? So people being excluded. So more and more factors which are being considered. And it's very complex. And sometimes it's difficult because sometimes, you know, we have to have difficult conversations with organizations who may not necessarily be doing anything wrong, but.
You know, they, they just may not have had anybody ask for, you know, a particular piece of information or to do a particular process a certain way. But, you know, like everyone else in the field, we're always learning and we're striving for continuous improvement, which is one of our core values as an organization.
And, um, assuming good intent, which is what we do with all of our partners and continuous improvement, and we bear that in mind with who we work with.
[00:35:34] Phil Dillard: Yeah, that makes a ton of. I think it's, uh, it's really, really clear. Right. I, you made a really interesting point. I've talked about this with some folks who were talking about grasslands should be grasslands, forest should be forests.
And there's a difference between plantations and forests cuz it doesn't necessarily bring, doesn't deliver the carbon benefits, doesn't deliver the wildlife benefits. It doesn't reforest. Just because you plant trees, you need to plant them, the right ecosystem of flora and fauna that are going to regenerate the system.
And it sounds like you guys have the right bubble on that. So, um, kudos to you. My last question before we go to the lightning round, it's one that speaks a little bit to the competitive point that you brought up. You said, you know, you shared that there are a large number of, uh, organizations out there who are doing certain things.
Why do you think your donors. Whether they're big corporates or whether they're just individuals, why do you think they choose?
[00:36:26] Louis Lagoutte: That's a very good question, and I think the, the reasons why they do differ a lot, whether it's kind of an individual or, or a large corporate, for example, I think for some of the individuals who donate to us, I think part of it is the simplicity and it's the storytelling.
I think we have very effective storytelling, for example, on social media and on Instagram, engage people. So it's, it's a. For people to take a simple action, which feels very tangible because it's also resulting and you get the information about what's happening specifically. So instead of it just being you've planted a tree, which project do you want?
What are the impacts and why and where. So people can say, okay, the. Supporting a project which is planting trees, for example, working with, um, in, in the south of Ecuador, we worked with an indigenous women's organization doing restoration that so they can support that specifically because maybe they care about the intersection of indigenous rights, women's rights, and ecological restoration, or, Fire restriction.
So I think that helps the individuals because really they can get into, you know, where they're having an impact. And, and why now for the very large, um, projects, so Nestle and, and AstraZeneca, two of our are very large, um, partners. We are very nimble with them. And you know, when, when they, and we help to develop custom projects, we have a great network of local organiz.
On the ground. And so they said, okay, here's where we want to have an impact. These are sort of the impacts we want to have. And so we were able to, you know, with our network, look at what is possible, develop projects from the ground up, built with them in collaboration with them instead of, instead of it being something which, you know, they came in later.
And I think part of it was also the fact that, you know, we are growing, we're a young organization, means that we still have the opportunity to do things differently and to learn. When these organizations come in, we can align on our goals. We can align on, you know, how our interests converge in order to kind of have the most successful partnership.
And we can build the partnership model itself depending on what they need, rather than them having to fit into a a preexisting model of partnership and
[00:38:27] Phil Dillard: collaboration. That's great cuz it, you know, the alignment means that they can do things that matter to the, to their consumers and to their executives, to the stakeholders inside the organization that wanna see a certain result.
Right? If you make clothes, do something that's related to making clothes, right? If you make food, do something that's related to making food then aligned to you, like recovering from whatever damage you might have done and the nimbleness. That seems to make a, make a lot of sense and sounds, sounds really great.
It sounds like you've got something that. That's really good. And then that's, uh, that's working here. So I'm gonna shift real quick to our lightning round questions. It's a, you know, quick response we ask everybody at the end of the show. So 10 years from now, what does success look like to you?
[00:39:09] Louis Lagoutte: 10 years from now.
Success to me looks like large areas of land which are not thriving in Richard Barron being abundant with life and being restored to their full diversity and
[00:39:21] Phil Dillard: beauty. Cool. So question number two. Outside of your company, is there a project, campaign or program or some other creation that inspires you? An
[00:39:30] Louis Lagoutte: organization who I, I really admire, and I think the work they do is very effective.
It's called the World Land Trust. Um, I think they're based out of the UK and they have a very, very simple goal, which is to take land and to protect it. And often what that means is they take land and they put it in the hands of indigenous folks or, um, you know, local. So it's not a kind of them buying up land to kind of just hoard it.
They're really working to kind of help those organizations on the ground. I've always liked their work and admire their work, and I do feel like. Something very appealing about the, the permanence of putting land in the hands of, of the right communities and the right peoples. And I think that as a kind of goal can also address a lot of the, you know, colonial, historic kind of land.
Imbalances, which, which have been so exploitative, um,
[00:40:20] Phil Dillard: to this day. Sure. And, and to balance the fact that some of these, um, some of the poor nations don't have the ability to establish maybe national parks for example, in the same way and enforce protection of them, and maybe the land trust can help with that.
That's a great point. Question number three. What are the most important things individuals can do to lead to a better. Very
[00:40:40] Louis Lagoutte: broadly speaking, kind of better future. I, I would say kind of be educated and be engaged politically and in your community. And then on a kind of very specific sense, I would say making space for nature.
And I think that could be something like creating a small pond. In a back garden where maybe some frogs and some dragonflies can come. Maybe it's putting up a bird box, maybe it's creating, you know, something like a wildflower meadow where pollinators can come, where it's just leaving, you know, some sticks and, and cut down branches in a little pile at the bottom of your garden.
Maybe a hedge will come, you know, make its home there. So I think. Making space for nature also very rewarding, I feel on a kind of, for the soul, if you kind of make something and then you see some animals arriving, making it their home and thriving there, I think it, it reconnects us a bit to something which we've
[00:41:29] Phil Dillard: lost.
Yeah, I love that. I like the way you say it. Make it too, because if you create it, You create an opportunity to remind yourself not only that you shouldn't be disconnected, but that you can actually create a connection, which is awesome. Uh, last question. What would you say that governments can do to lead to a better future?
[00:41:47] Louis Lagoutte: Governments have an immense power, which, which, you know, you and I don't, which is to make policy. And there are so many things which, you know, governments, for all of their talk, they could, for example, in the, in the European Union talking a lot about, you know, Indonesia and, you know, palm oil and deforestation, the EU could ban the import of palm oil.
Next week if they wanted to. So I think you, the governments can absolutely make policies and make laws to prevent harm starting right now. NGOs, I think, can drive action. I think sometimes when policy makers are kind of lacking in their, uh, actions. So NGOs I think can take action. I think there's a lot to be said for, you know, advocacy and raising awareness about issues, but also to some extent, I feel like.
Sometimes, you know, I hear about this campaign, we need to make people aware about habitat loss or where about biodiversity and everybody could be aware of it and we could still be doing nothing. You know, it's, it's, it's one thing, being, being aware of it, but, but that is no substitute for action. So I feel like action is really, really, um, key.
[00:42:48] Phil Dillard: Absolutely. I get it. You know, I think, uh, people get educated and aware and they can still just stare and stand by and watch things happen, right? You still, you gotta get in the game. You gotta get into a fight. And I think it's a, it's a good way to close because it is a fight, it's a fight for the future.
It's a fight for nature and it's more against apathy and ignorance than it really is against, like other people or, or certain ways of living. So it's really, really great to, uh, get to meet you and get to know you a little bit, Louie, and, uh, really appreciate you making the time.
[00:43:17] Louis Lagoutte: Thank you, Phil. It's really, really been been a pleasure and I, I really, really, I think I'll take away what you said, what you said at the end, which I, I really, really, um, struck me and it's, it's not a fight against anyone or any, anything.
It's really just against, against apathy, um, and ignorance and it's really wonderful conversation. Um, and I'm, yeah, looking forward to, to following also, um, you know, your podcast and everything that you are doing to, to, to hear about, you know, everyone else in this field and
[00:43:42] Phil Dillard: all the work. Well, thanks so much and we look forward to, uh, seeing how we can be helpful to help you guys achieve your mission. And thanks everybody for joining. Um, see you again next time on episode of Thruline to the 4th Sector. Talk to you soon.
[00:43:55] Narrator: Final Thoughts on Earth Day? Come to you from James Ehrlich, Founder of Regen Villages Holding.
[00:44:01] James Ehrlich: Every day is Earth Day and it is a bit like celebrating Mother's Day. Right. You know, it's essentially, it's something that you celebrate and need to celebrate every single day and be an awareness of the fact that we are on this tiny pale blue dot together and we have this opportunity. To live in flourishing abundance, so long as we are compassionate and altruistic and focus on the things that we need to focus on for healthier living.
[00:44:36] Narrator: Thank you for listening to our special Earth Day episode.
[00:44:40] Phil Dillard: Thank you for listening to this episode of Thruline to the 4th Sector. I'm your host, Phil Dillard. If you enjoyed the show, please leave a rating and tell a friend. To learn more about the fourth sector economy, visit thrulinenetworks.com. That's T H R U L I N E networks.com. Thanks again and we hope to have you with us in the next.