We met the Giving Tuesday challenge! Twenty donors helped us match Nance Hikes $5K pledge and surpass our $10,000 Giving Tuesday goal. Thank you! 

Thank you to the Native Future Board of Directors and 120 donors for raising $50K. $13,000 to go!

~ ~ ~

This has been a very challenging year. 

At the end of 2024, Native Future and Indigenous partners in Panama were poised to make significant progress protecting and revitalizing their land and culture.  By July 2025, $450,000 in US Government grants to Native Future had been terminated; 50% of our budget over the next two years. 

Thankfully, generous partners Otter Fonds and the Mycorrhizal Fund responded rapidly to the crisis, and with a grant from Panama's Green Fund (Fondo Verde), we've been able to recuperate $250,000 to partially carry on some of the activities with Indigenous communities.

Still, we're facing a $200,000 deficit over the next two years. 

Your donation to any program helps bridge the gap.

• Wounaan seed sharing and tree planting work will be completely unfunded by 2026. 
• Forest fire fighting and prevention training, too, just as the dry season begins in Panama when forest fire threat is greatest.
• Additional Indigenous territorial monitoring teams will not be trained to successfully report deforestation and fire to Panama's environmental authorities, and 
• Our capacity to support community ecotourism development will precipitously decline.

Your donation will help us continue all of our vital programs. And it helps us match the pledge of Biome/International Conservation Fund of Canada.

Your support, at any level, means so very much to this cause.

~ ~ ~

Your donation to Native Future supports partnering Wounaan, Ngäbe and Buglé communities and organizations to:

Yadira Carpio graduation

Access education and training that meets their Indigenous development goals. For example, your donation supports Ngäbe student, Alcibiade Angel Pita, to earn his law degree and advocate for his community. It helps local Wounaan ecotourism guides take English classes. It helped Wounaan forestry student, Yadira Carpio, graduate from university this year. Today, Yadira works for Panama's Ministry of Environment developing community forest management plans with Indigenous communities. Indigenous Learning and Leadership remains at the heart of lasting change.

Monitors inspecting deforestation and burn

Protect and secure their land rights and natural resources. Seven Wounaan territories (350,000 acres) are not legally recognized by the Government of Panama, and therefore, under constant threat of deforestation, fire and theft by illegal loggers and cattle ranchers. While the applications for collective ownership of their territories are processed, Wounaan are monitoring and reporting the environmental damages to Panama's Ministry of Environment, and bringing the violators to justice. The case of Aruza underscores the importance (and power) of territorial monitoring to the security of Indigenous lands and biodiversity. 

Tree scaling and seed collection training.

Revitalize their culture and language, and restore the biodiversity important to their way of life.  The Biocultural Restoration program was funded by a now-canceled US Government grant. Five Wounaan communities came together to share their traditional tree planting practices with each other, and develop a seed sharing strategy, identifying more than 30 culturally important native trees that they want to plant in their degraded forests. With your support, they can continue this vital work.

In the following video, Rio Platanares leader, Adan Puchicama, eloquently captures the importance of cultural survival to Wounaan and one way they are reviving it. Without security of their land and natural resources, their sustainable way of life and the biodiversity it supports is at risk of disappearing.  

 

Thank you for supporting Indigenous peoples to protect and secure their nature and culture!

From the bottom of our hearts. 

~ ~ ~

Prefer to donate by mail? 
Send a check to: Native Future, PO Box 91, Scarborough, ME 04070-0091