Remember to collect your stamps – both ordinary and commemorative stamps. There is a box just inside the church, on the right, for your stamps.
This year stamp appeal proceeds will go towards establishing the tree nurseries.
Firmly Planted: Agroforestry for Sustainability
Firmly Planted is a community-based agroforestry initiative with the ambition of making a sustainable impact across Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe. It is spearheaded by our partners in the Church of Central Africa Presbyterian (CCAP), and built around the church’s community structures. The initiative will resource individual groups to respond to the various challenges affecting Malawi today.
Agroforestry presents an opportunity to address challenges of food insecurity, deforestation, climate change and youth unemployment. Tree nurseries create employment opportunities, fruit trees improve nutrition and wider tree planting helps mitigate the impact of the climate crisis, in turn improving agricultural productivity.
Firmly Planted will provide community-based training tailored to the community’s needs, ensuring woodlots are well maintained to have the greatest chance to thrive. The programme, through effective distribution, looks to attain large-scale tree planting of locally relevant woodlots – these could be linked to schools, churches, clinics and community groups. Having already established a pilot tree nursery, CCAP is looking to replicate this across the Synods by implementing Central Tree Nursery Hubs allowing each nursery to grow tree seedlings based on the needs of their communities.
Our mission partner, Gary Brough, is one of the project coordinators and is looking for opportunities to grow the project. You can keep up to date with Gary’s work on the Mission Partner page of the Church of Scotland website. The Guild is also involved in supporting this programme.