/ PROJECTS
Our projects advance regeneration where finance, ecology, and community meet.
RDG works with governments, UN agencies, development finance institutions, NGOs, and landscape partnerships to design programs, structure blended and nature-positive finance, and build the capacity that makes regenerative work fundable and durable.
/ FEATURED PROJECT
Ecosystem Restoration in Angola’s Extended Central Plateau
Location: Huambo · Bié · Moxico Provinces, Angola
Client / partners: UNDP · Ministry of Environment, Institute of Biodiversity and Area Conservation (MINAMB/INBC) · Global Environment Facility (GEF-8)
Years: 2023 – ongoing
We designed the flagship child project under the GEF-8 Ecosystem Restoration Integrated Program, submitted for CEO endorsement in 2024. The seven-year, USD 14.4 million GEF grant (USD 121.8 million in co-financing) targets restoration of degraded ecosystems, community-based land and forest management, and sustainable land management across the biodiverse headwaters of the Okavango and Zambezi basins.
The project is structured around four components: enabling policy conditions and inclusive governance for restoration; on-the-ground restoration innovations across five priority sites in the ECP and payment-for-ecosystem-services design in the Kwanza Basin; institutional readiness for large-scale sustainable finance including sustainable bonds, carbon and biodiversity credits, and linked trust funds; and knowledge management and capacity development.
The project also frames four Communities of Practice — Agriculture, Logistics, Conservation & Restoration, and Carbon — to build the capacity Angola needs to scope, credibly deliver, and fund projects at scale.
/ SELECTED PROJECTS
More work from RDG across landscapes, finance, and community.
Technical Finance Lead — 1000 Landscapes for 1 Billion People
Location: Mexico · Vietnam · Malawi
Client / partners: 1000 Landscapes for 1 Billion People · Rainforest Alliance · SNV · Mount Mulanje Conservation Trust
Years: 2022 – 2024
RDG served as the technical finance lead for 1000 Landscapes for 1 Billion People, contributing to the development of the Landscape Finance Accelerator — a bottom-up methodology tested in landscape partnerships in Mexico, Vietnam, and Malawi. The work integrated carbon-readiness, payment for ecosystem services, and conservation trust funds into practical pathways landscape partnerships could actually finance. The engagement culminated in RDG’s publication Landscape Finance Roadmap: Pathways to Mobilize Finance for Sustainable Landscapes (June 2024).
REDD+, Community Livelihoods, and Circular-Waste ProDoc — Angola
Location: Cubango and Cuando Cubango landscapes; Luanda Province
Client / partners: UNDP Angola · Ministry of Environment (MINAMB)
Year: 2025 – 2026
RDG contributed to the design of Angola’s REDD+, livelihoods, and circular-waste ProDoc, covering national REDD readiness and institutional capacity, priority-landscape work in the Cubango/Cuando Cubango system with at least two pilot communities, and a Luanda circular-economy pilot for community-based waste transfer and recycling. The work sits under UNDP Direct Implementation Modality and integrates MRV, National Forest Monitoring System, and Safeguards Information System scoping with community-scale intervention design.
Tanzania Tourism Sector Support
Location: Tanzania (national and Mtwara Region)
Client / partners: The World Bank · IFC · TATO
Years: 2020 – 2022
RDG designed a concessional loan fund to sustain Tanzania’s tourism operators through the COVID-19 downturn, protecting livelihoods and conservation-linked businesses whose viability underpins landscape-scale conservation. In parallel, RDG assessed Mtwara’s tourism potential and produced a development strategy to guide sector investment and growth, tying tourism revenue to conservation outcomes.
Accelerating Landscape Investments for REDD+ Projects
Location: Southern Africa
Client / partners: The World Bank · IFC · Peace Parks Foundation
RDG structured investment pathways to accelerate REDD+ project readiness and mobilize climate finance at landscape scale in partnership with Peace Parks Foundation, connecting conservation programming with the financial architecture that lets it scale.
/ FEATURED WORK FROM OUR TEAM ECOLOGIST
The Al Baydha Project — Regenerative Agriculture in the Saudi Desert
Location: Makkah Province, Saudi Arabia
The Al Baydha Project documents the restoration of a hyper-arid Saudi Arabian desert landscape using low-tech, low-cost interventions — earthworks, agroforestry, and native-species planting — to reverse desertification and rebuild soil, water, and biodiversity in a climate that receives only a few centimetres of rainfall a year. Featured here as inspiration for what regenerative land management can achieve in the world’s most degraded landscapes.
Video: “The Story of Al Baydha: A Regenerative Agriculture in the Saudi Desert” by Neal Spackman.
Led by Neal Spackman.
/ WHERE WE’VE WORKED
Angola · Bolivia · Peru · Tanzania · Mozambique · Mexico · Vietnam · Malawi · Saudi Arabia · The Gambia · United Arab Emirates
/ LET’S MAKE AN IMPACT TOGETHER
Working on a program, fund, or enterprise that needs financial architecture to match its ambition?
Tell us about your project — we’d like to hear from you.
Regenerative Development Group 