Yeshi's story
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Meet Yeshi
“I am Yeshi, I am 45 years old and I have three children." Before, Yeshi supported her three children by farming and selling things like tea to people in her village. But with a changing climate affecting her crop growth, making enough money to support her family was a challenge.
Since a project came to her village three years ago, she has learnt to extract frankincense from trees in her local forest which she sells to earn a more stable and resilient source of income.
Before the project
“Before the introduction of the project, frankincense producers came from other regions and we did not benefit from the resources.” Due to lack of training and production materials, Yeshi's community struggled to get involved in the frankincense industry.
As a result the forest was being used by people from other regions instead, who had little interest in protecting the frankincense forest and many trees were damaged.
“Frankincense trees are very important for me and the community. They help us generate income and diversify our economic sources.”
Since joining the project
But since the project, ran by Tree Aid's partner SUNARMA, came to her village, Yeshi has transformed her life in so many ways. She said, "The project has delivered training that will help us to produce frankincense. The project has helped us to diversify our income sources and generate substantial income from the sale of frankincense."
At the same time, she is now working with her community to protect and care for their trees to ensure they are around for many years to come.
Looking to the future
Yeshi is hopeful that, with the skills and tools she has gained, she will be able to protect and use her forest to grow a better future for her family.
She tells us that, “if the project carries on we hope that the forest will be sustainably maintained for the long-term, and at the same time, we will be able to benefit from the resource that we have.”
