Raine Donohue

As a sustainable development practitioner and consultant, Raine is passionate about working with communities, public, and private entities to find a balance between livelihood needs and biodiversity conservation. Over the past eight years, Raine’s work has focused on understanding the role of the business sector and its ability to amplify the positive impacts of development work in Latin America. She has collaborated with organizations such as Fundación Aliados, Earth Innovation Institute, Green Value, and The Nature Conservancy. She holds a master’s degree in Sustainable Development Practice (MDP) from the University of Florida where she specialized in the socio-economic impacts of small-scale agriculture production and non-timber forest product (NTFP) value chain development. Raine is an avid traveler, outdoor enthusiast, and explorer of different cultures, cuisines, and music.

Connecting local economies with global carbon markets – Building a hybrid market-based model for the sustainable use of non-timber forest products

This project aims to link forest-based economies with the growing carbon credits market. The goal is to build a hybrid production model in which forest-reliant communities sustainably manage their resources and generate supplemental income earned from carbon credits. The Amazon region of South America stores billions of tons of carbon, yet carbon markets are often inaccessible for rural, small-scale producers. Additionally, large expanses of this area are destroyed annually to harvest NTFPs for local and international markets. Financial analyses of some value chains indicate that the price paid for NTFPs does not cover the cost of production, resulting in local harvesters operating at a significant financial loss. The objectives of this project are to (1) utilize the Green Value Tool ® to provide producers with financial knowledge about their operations, and (2) use the results from the financial analysis to examine pathways for integration into the carbon credits market.