Kampala – The Environmental Conservation Trust of Uganda (ECOTRUST), the country’s leading conservation financing organization, celebrated its 25th anniversary during its annual stakeholders’ meeting.
The event highlighted ECOTRUST’s significant contributions to landscape restoration, sustainable livelihoods, and climate action over the last two decades.
Speaking at the event in Kampala, Isaac Kapalaga, the newly appointed Chairman of the ECOTRUST Board of Trustees, emphasized the organization’s commitment to innovative and impactful conservation solutions.
Kapalaga praised ECOTRUST’s position as a leader in designing and implementing market-based conservation incentives, citing its blended financing model that ensures $6 out of every $10 for climate action reaches beneficiaries as direct cash transfers.
This approach combines contributions from private, public, internal revenue, and community sources, enabling community-led actions to deliver scalable and cost-effective conservation outcomes.
Pauline Nantongo Kalunda, ECOTRUST’s Executive Director, paid tribute to the organization’s partners, including grassroots communities and government agencies, for their support in driving its success.
She highlighted ECOTRUST’s innovative approach to ecosystem restoration, where landowners voluntarily allocate land for conservation.
Kalunda explained that the organization’s incentive models and equitable benefit-sharing systems balance conservation and livelihood goals, creating a cutting-edge aggregation model for marketing environmental services internationally.
These efforts have positioned ECOTRUST as a leader in conservation financing, delivering market-based incentives for landscape restoration and sustainable development.
Looking to the future, Kalunda outlined ECOTRUST’s plans to integrate advanced technologies into its operations.
The organization is adopting digital and satellite-based monitoring, reporting, and verification systems to enhance transparency and efficiency.
This will be complemented by the Gender Action and Learning System (GALS) methodology to facilitate joint visioning and planning at household and community levels.
ECOTRUST also plans to de-risk smallholder afforestation investments, expand restoration efforts, and support these initiatives with a capitalized trust fund to ensure long-term sustainability.
Under its 2022-2026 Strategic Plan, ECOTRUST is working to improve the livelihoods and adaptive capacities of 16.5 million people across 33 districts in Uganda.
In 2023 alone, the organization recruited 30,829 new farmers, placed 17,480.2 hectares under improved management, planted over 4.3 million trees, disbursed Shs10 billion to smallholders as Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES), and sequestered 3.4 million tons of carbon through nearly 10,000 hectares of young trees.
Reflecting on these achievements, Kalunda attributed the milestones to collaborative partnerships and innovative resource mobilization.
With its Triple-Win Model—focusing on biodiversity conservation, sustainable livelihoods, and climate change mitigation—ECOTRUST continues to inspire communities and partners to restore ecosystems and improve livelihoods across Uganda.
As it celebrates 25 years of success, ECOTRUST remains a beacon of hope and a leader in transformative conservation financing, paving the way for a sustainable future.