This article outlines how your TerraFund project will be managed and supported from start to finish by the dedicated support teams at WRI, VIA Foundation, and Africa Trees.
Article Outline
Core Roles on the TerraFund Support Team - Non-profits
Core Roles on TerraFund Support Team - Enterprises
What to do When Your Project Scope Changes
How to Request Changing Tree Species
How to Escalate Questions or Concerns
Core Roles on TerraFund Support Team - Non-profits
VIA Foundation Project Manager
The project manager is a primary point of contact for organizations throughout the project lifecycle, and should generally be a first contact for project planning, execution, timeline or delivery changes, and other questions. Your project manager will quality-assure your reports and will conduct site visits to your project. They are your first line of support for your project, and can help connect you with others on the team for more specialized support as needed.
VIA Foundation Field Coordinator
The field coordinator provides in-field support for geospatial data collection and restoration implementation. This role is similar to a specialized extension agent.
VIA Foundation Grants & Finance Specialist
The grants & finance specialist will be your point of contact for all contract questions and payment disbursement questions, and they will quality-assure your financial reports.
WRI Portfolio Manager
This role is focused on peer-to-peer learning and capacity-building.
WRI GIS Associate
This role would be the lead for GIS and monitoring, and would review and quality-assure geospatial data that a project submits.
WRI TerraMatch Team
The TerraMatch Product Team will support your project with any questions related to TerraMatch, as you deepen your engagement on the platform through completing your project, nursery, and site profiles, and then reporting throughout your project's lifecycle.
Core Roles on TerraFund Support Team - Enterprises
WRI Portfolio Manager
The portfolio manager will be a primary point of contact throughout the project lifecycle, similar to the "Project Manager" role outlined above.
VIA Foundation Field Coordinator
The field coordinator provides in-field support for geospatial data collection and restoration implementation. This role is similar to a specialized extension agent.
WRI GIS Associate
This role would be the lead for GIS and monitoring, and would review and quality-assure geospatial data that a project submits.
Realize Impact Financial Team
This team will be your point of contact for all contract questions and payment disbursement questions, and they will quality-assure your financial reports.
WRI TerraMatch Team
The TerraMatch Product Team will support your project with any questions related to TerraMatch, as you deepen your engagement on the platform through completing your project, nursery, and site profiles, and then reporting throughout your project's lifecycle.
Please note: you may also interact with the Communications team based at WRI, and other support staff within VIA Foundation, WRI, and Africa Trees or other partner organizations, as relevant.
What to do When Your Project Scope Changes
Restoration projects evolve as the work progresses. In the event of unexpected challenges or opportunities, the scope of work for a TerraFund restoration champion may change. There are range of possible changes: Tree species, site location, community engagement approach, update to the targets for hectares to be restored or trees to be planted, and organizational changes, among others.
As soon as there is any indication that there may be a change to the project scope, you will need to reach out to your project manager. The sooner, the better. You must get your project manager's approval before you proceed with any changes that affect your projects goals or targets.
The Process
Please note that depending on the type of change, the steps may differ. You may be able to come to a quick verbal agreement with your project manager, or you may be required to submit a formal letter detailing the change.
- Communicate with your TerraFund project manager as soon as you are aware of any potential change, and they will guide you through the process:
- For most changes, you may need to update your TerraMatch profile so that it reflects the most up to date information for your work.
- These profiles are a key part of the TerraFund Monitoring, Reporting, and Verification (MRV) framework, so it is essential that the information on these profiles is as accurate and up to date as possible.
- This may be as simple as updating the number of community members you intend to engage or the tree species that you are growing. Or, this may require more significant changes, like creating new site profiles or new site boundaries.
- If there are changes to any of the targets or details that were agreed upon in your contract, there may be additional steps involved. You may need to work with your project manager to create an amendment to your contract.
How to Request Changing Tree Species
Every restoration champion that receives finance from TerraFund for AFR100, sign agreements with TerraFund to grow trees and restore degraded landscapes. In that agreement, each partner specifies the total number of trees to be planted and the total number of trees to be restored per tree species, after 6 years of implementation.
Every six months, restoration champions report the number of seedlings or saplings that they have grown in their nurseries, broken down by species, and the number of trees that they have planted and/or naturally regenerated on each restoration site, also broken down by species.
While implementing the project, champions may find themselves in a situation that justify the revision of the species that they grow.
Before replacing, changing or removing species, restoration champions should request officially the authorization from TerraFund for AFR100 by contacting their Project Manager with a signed document, which clearly highlights:
- The ecological characteristics of new tree species compared to the ones to be replaced.
- The socio-economic benefits of new tree species compared to those of the tree species to be replaced.
- The motivation of changing tree species (community needs, budget issues, project timeline, seed availability, etc).
- How changing the tree species will contribute to the success of the project or how not changing the proposed tree species will affect the project negatively.
- The tangible facts that demonstrate an absolute necessity to change the initial tree species.
- The new number of trees by species for all species that we have in the agreement, including the added species.
The proposed change should not represent more than 30% of the trees associated with the project; native trees cannot be replaced with non-native trees; fruit tree species cannot be changed to non-fruit tree species; and trees cannot be replaced with non-tree species (e.g. bananas, passion fruit, papaya, tree tomato, coffee or shrubs).
If you change tree species without your Project Manager's authorization, the number of trees planted of any species that do not appear in the agreement cannot be counted toward your project’s total.
How to Escalate Questions or Concerns
If you have a question or concern about your project, your contract, or your engagement with TerraFund, that you cannot resolve with your Field Coordinator and/or Project Manager, you can reach out to info@terramatch.org and our support team will review your request and connect you with the appropriate staff at VIA, Africa Trees, or WRI to further assist you.
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