NATURE+ RESTORE: Research and action for landscape restoration. Work package highlights 2022-2024

CGIAR’s NATURE+ Initiative work package RESTORE made significant progress in farm- and landscape-level restoration, integrating research with innovative tools to address degraded rural ecosystems. Operating in five countries—Burkina Faso, Colombia, India, Kenya, and Vietnam—the program employs tools like Diversity for Restoration (D4R) and My Farm Trees to align local restoration efforts with broader biodiversity and ecosystem goals. One of RESTORE’s primary goals is to combine local knowledge, community participation, native tree species and cutting-edge research to increase the success rate of restoration initiatives.

Among many other work package highlights, the D4R tool cataloged over 600 native tree species, providing site-specific guidance by combining scientific data with traditional knowledge to support biodiversity conservation, soil fertility improvement, and agroforestry. In Burkina Faso, surveys of 600 small nurseries highlighted the potential for meeting the nation’s 5-million-hectare restoration target. Meanwhile, in Kenya and Cameroon, the My Farm Trees platform incentivized smallholders to plant over 220,000 seedlings across 2,600 hectares, offering digital payments to encourage participation.

Looking ahead, RESTORE aims to scale its solutions under CGIAR’s Research Portfolio 2025-2030. By strengthening seed systems, fostering investments, and expanding digital tools, the initiative is poised to tackle land degradation and enhance climate resilience in vulnerable regions in several additional countries.

Please read our RESTORE work package report here: NATURE+ RESTORE 2022-2024