Mvule Project

The Mvule Project is a non-profit organization founded by Kibo Group International, to promote healthy Western participation in Africa, tangibly reducing the impact of the deforestation while addressing the underlying issues of poverty, injustice and oppression. One of the project's schemes gives Americans an opportunity to buy a tree in Uganda. The income from planting and mainting the trees will then provide income to a rural village which they can then use to dig wells or build schools.

History

Europeans interested in felling timber in Uganda visited the Busoga region in the 1880s. They recognized the mvule tree's potential for providing hardwood for construction and carpentry. The Europeans then began extensive harvesting of the tree.

More than 100 years later the Mvule tree (Milicia excelsa) is severely threatened. Despite decades of efforts by forestry officials, the Mvule is quickly disappearing as younger and younger trees fall to provide wood for furniture, building and charcoal. There is little that can be done to replace the slow-growing Mvule because the trees do not grow in forests, but rather haphazardly across Basoga. Efforts to grow them in nurseries are not successful because of blight. The Mvule is a resilient tree once it reaches a certain age, but before that age it is easily threatened. Every systematic effort to replant Mvules has failed over the last 30 years.

How it Works

Each mvule tree is planted by a Ugandan village. The income that the village receives is used to build schools and dig water wells. For each mvule tree that continues to live month after month, the project compensates the village.

Americans are able to contribute to the long-term stability of Uganda by investing in the education, economy, and ecology of each village.

External links

• Official Mvule Project Site
• Kibo Group International

Sources

• World Conservation Monitoring Centre 1998. Milicia excelsa. 2006 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Downloaded on 22 August 2007.