Reforestation efforts too often fail not from lack of care, but from the lack of alignment between impact funders and communities on-the-ground, short-term metrics and long-term tree survival. The Bioregional Reforestation Grants Round was created to address this gap.

Launched as an outcomes-based, plant-to-earn reforestation campaign, the fundraising round mobilizes $100,000 in matching funds to support community-led reforestation across eight critical bioregions. The initiative directs resources toward demonstrated ecological impact, rewarding long-term stewardship of trees planted.

At the heart of the round is a simple idea: bioregions matter. Ecological restoration is deeply place-based, shaped by local knowledge, relationships, and responsibility to land. By organizing funding at the bioregional level, the funding round empowers local organizing teams to define priorities, coordinate tree planting and care stewards, and lead reforestation efforts grounded in their own landscapes.

The funding model invites broad public participation. Donors support the bioregions they believe in by making small donations, helping to determine how the $100,000 in matching funds are distributed, while local stewards carry out tree planting and long-term care activities. Local tree planting funding within each bioregion is tied to verification, ensuring trees are not only planted, but survive, building trust between global supporters and those working to restore ecosystems locally.

Led by Silvi in collaboration with Climate Coordination Network and the BioFi Project, and hosted through Gitcoin on the Celo ecosystem, the Bioregional Reforestation Grants Round demonstrated how digital public goods can support ecological restoration without extracting agency from local communities. Transparency, accountability, and reciprocity replace speculation, allowing regeneration to be funded with confidence.

ArtEcology served as the storytelling and narrative partner for the round, shaping how this complex funding experiment was communicated, understood, and felt. While advising on the application of outcome-based conservation finance, ArtEcology’s primary role was to translate mechanism into meaning.

The studio led campaign storytelling across blogs, videos, announcements, and social media, coordinated community onboarding and public events, and worked closely with bioregional teams to tell their stories through place-based video content. The Bioregional Reforestation Hyperstition announcement garnered 45K impressions and over 120 unique engagements. In tandem we worked with En0va to launch a hyperstition market coinciding with the fundraise with the Bioregional Reforestation Hyperstition announcement which saw 19K impressions. Several podcasts and talks were also booked to support the campaign including: Gitcoin Schelling Point Talk on Hyperstition Markets (5K im), Green Pill Podcast (1K im), Silvi Greenpill Twitter Spaces (1K im), and Crypto Altruists podcast (2.6K). In total the campaign raised $4,538 dollars in addition to the $100,000 matching pool while dramatically increasing brand awareness of the sponsors leading the project. Through strategic communication and community coordination, ArtEcology positioned the grants round not just as a funding mechanism, but as a shared experiment in trust, one that proves ecological restoration can be transparent, accountable, and human-centered at the same time.

More than a grants program, the Bioregional Reforestation Grants Round stands as a proof of concept for regenerative finance rooted in place. It points toward a future where global capital flows can meaningfully support local ecological leadership, funding not only trees in the ground, but the relationships that allow forests, and communities, to endure.