Scenes like this o­ne in Ethiopia can be found throughout Africa and around the world. As much as 95% of the area’s forest land has been destroyed by developers and people clearing land for farming or firewood.

Deforestation is a global environmental concern.  However, in Third World countries, it’s an immediate matter of life and death.

In the last three years alone, an estimated 250,000 people have died of starvation in and around Ethiopia.  Few people understand that deforestation is the major cause of these drought-induced famines.  Tragically, there are few organizations that are actually doing much to reverse this ecological trend.

Driven by a desire to care for God's creation—the Earth and the people who live o­n it—we launched The Eden Projects.

Our strategy is simple.  We begin with seedlings—millions of them—raised in nurseries located in and around rural villages and o­n land donated by the government.  Of course, seedlings need care and eventually planting, so we hire local residents to do the job.  This becomes a vital part of our outreach in regions where the majority of the labor pool is unemployed.  As workers learn to care for their plantings, they learn to care for their environment, how to preserve clean water sources, enrich their farmlands and maintain reliable, renewable supplies of firewood and lumber.  Community leaders, involved in every step of the process, see immediate benefits.  They quickly become committed to supporting the work and to protecting their future forests.

Because we partner with organizations which have already established local infrastructure and built relationships with regional leaders, we are able to expand more rapidly and deliver results far more quickly than traditional groups that start from scratch.

Heavenly Treasures contributes the proceeds from the sale of Ethiopian Coffee to the ministry of Eden Projects.  For more info go to http://edenprojects.org/