We took a break from our work reports in June and July 2024, as we know from experience that most readers are on vacation during this time and have better things to do than read our reports. However, not sending out a work report does not mean not working, as we continued full steam ahead.
We have now been able to deliver 102 school chairs again. This time spread across three schools, because the need is so great that we had to draw up a priority list to ensure at least a moderate improvement in needs. Although the population in Mati is still only growing slowly (0.8 percent in 2022), the number of inhabitants has increased from 1,365 in 1903 to 147,547 in 2020, and the many children all want and need to go to school.
As a reminder: our school chairs are made from melted down old plastic, are super sturdy and designed for the tropics because they are rot-proof. Extreme rainfall and flooding are on the increase due to weather shifts. As a result, the classrooms are often under water, as the village of Mati is only a few meters above sea level. The school chairs made of cheap wood are washed away or the wood becomes unstable due to the wetness and the children have nowhere to sit. Our heavy-duty chairs are different. They remain like a rock in the Bandung. The manufacturer, Envirotech in Davao, gives us a ten-year guarantee on “indestructibility”. Even if a chair breaks, it can be melted down again to make a new one.
30 of the school chairs were donated by Andrea Kremlhofer (Tauchreisen.at) in Austria, a diving tour operator that supports social or environmental protection projects worldwide with 50 percent or more of the booking fees every month.

Owner Winchester Lemen shapes the sturdy school chairs from old plastic, but also builds garden furniture and many other outdoor products.

The pupils enjoy the very colorful school furniture and the teachers are amazed that these chairs were made from collected plastic.

Sibylle and Gerald.

Collecting plastic in the mangroves.

The other 72 are from Sibylle and Gerald from Germany. On the invitations to their birthday party, they told their guests that they didn’t want any presents. If any of the guests wanted to do something good, they should donate a school chair. This is how the incredible amount of 72 chairs came together. Gerald, who organizes diving trips for a living (g.nowak@waterworld.at), took a look at the school chair project in Mati, Davao Oriental, and recognized the need.
More about the school furniture here:
https://mama-earth.de/produkt/mama-earth-schulstuehle/ Our mangrove plantations are running at full speed. We restock our tree nurseries as soon as seedlings are released and space is available again. Our planters are highly motivated because we have now achieved a continuity that ensures that collecting seeds, growing them in the simple tree nurseries and planting them out continues until the areas are fully planted and we move on to the next planting site. If you would like to join us, here is the link to our counter: https://maliziamangrovepark.de/ As you know, we also work together with the turtle protection group “Amihan Brothers” in Mati. The members of the group search the beach every night to collect eggs that have been laid or buried and bury them in a safe place. This has already saved thousands of eggs from dogs, humans and birds. The hatchlings are then safely transferred to the sea in order to achieve the highest possible survival rate. The German foundation Melaafa from Munich has donated a laptop to the highly talented Peter Nicholas B. Playa from this group so that he can carry out his research more easily, as the 15-year-old already has an amazing knowledge of the underwater world.

We can help nature to regenerate.

Collecting the hatchlings.

Peter and his new laptop.

Part of the Amihan Group.

Plastic is the plague of our time. As a first step, we must do everything we can to stem the wave of single-use plastic. At the end of September 2024, the Melaafa Foundation and the Mama Earth Foundation will launch the first school project with the Max Planck School in Kiel and the Davao Oriental Regional Science High School in Mati, whose students are already chatting vigorously. The aim is to avoid disposable water bottles. To this end, ten drinking water dispensers will soon be set up on the school grounds, from which everyone can help themselves free of charge. At the same time, and to finance this, we are offering a high-quality double-walled 800-milliliter stainless steel tumbler for six euros in our store. If you would like to give one as a gift, just click on this link: https://mama-earth.de/produkt/tumbler/ All donated tumblers will be handed over to the school management and given to students who cannot afford a tumbler. We will report on an ongoing basis on how the campaign develops, as we are building a prototype here, which certainly still has a lot of catches. But one thing is already certain, because it is already working: part of the “Zero Hero” sticker on the tumbler is a QR code that leads to a blog where students from all over the world can share their ideas on how to slow down the flood of plastic. The decisive step before slowing down the plastic wave is the most important one: plastic avoidance! We must preserve our wonderful world.

Baumbuch

Wir müssen noch immer unser Baumbuch anbieten. Zirka 350 Bücher lagern in der Druckerei, was uns Lagerkosten verursacht. Wir bieten dieses hochwertig gebundene und mit vielen tollen Fotos illustrierte 196-Seiten-Buch zum Sonderpreis an: 10 Bücher für 50 Euro inklusive Porto. Allerdings können wir für diesen Sonderpreis keinen Baum als Zugabe mitliefern. Schreiben Sie uns eine E-Mail mit Ihrer Postadresse und schon geht es los. So haben Sie nicht nur interessanten Lesestoff, sondern auch Geschenke für alle Anlässe. Wir sind sicher, dass das Baumbuch Sie nicht enttäuschen wird.

Before our activities starts. The first two tumblers has already have new lucky owners.

Tumbler against disposable water bottles. With this small gesture, tons of disposable drinking bottles can be avoided.

Questions about the topic? Ask them to us!