Alumni Highlight: Christian Shearer, Co-Founder of Regen Network

Christian Shearer (ISB Class of 1996) has been at the cutting edge of global ecology since his early 20s.  He launched Panya Project (www.panyaproject.org) in the early 2000s, an ecological agriculture and natural building education center in Northern Thailand.  ISB students from the past 15 years or so are familiar with the Panya Project as it has been a popular site for ISB’s Week Without Walls and Global Citizenship Week programs.  

Most recently Christian co-founded Regen Network (www.regen.network), a startup technology company aimed at tracking, verifying, and valuing ecological information, particularly from the world’s farmers, ranchers and land managers. Regen Network has gained traction from a number of well-known natural products companies and some of the world’s largest producer groups. “What we are building unlocks the data for land managers and brands to make profitable, ecologically sound, management decisions,” shared Christian.

Regen Network plans to launch a number of pilot projects later this year, including a program to reward indigenous communities for forest stewardship, in partnership with the Rainforest Foundation. The program looks to scale up to over 25 million acres of indigenous land and to bring together the brands and consumers who are passionate about rainforest health with the stewards of the land.

In South East Asia, Regen Network has partnered with GenBlue and EarthPulse to work on the re-establishment of Mangrove ecosystems along the coastlines of Myanmar and beyond. Christian explains, “Mangrove ecosystems may be, dollar for dollar, the most effective ecological investment we can make right now. Worldwide, 85% of mangrove ecosystems are severely degraded and five species of mangrove are threatened with extinction. The habitat mangroves provide above and below the water, the reduction of coastal erosion, and the amount of carbon they sequester is of incredible value to this planet right now.”

ISB is proud of a graduate like Christian Shearer who is so passionately involved with trying to save our planet and in enriching communities globally. For more information, please reach out to the Regen Network (www.regen.network) or contact him directly (christian@regen.network).

 

from International School Bangkok https://ift.tt/2Q4mGBs