Paskaia - La Mosquitia

La Mosquitia, in northeastern Honduras, partners with the indigenous Miskito communities to restore degraded pine savannahs that typically burn in wildfires several times a year. By employing local fire brigades to control wildfires and integrating mahogany and cedar agroforestry on family-owned farmland, the project generates high-quality carbon credits that sustain rural livelihoods.
Working with researchers from leading universities in Sweden and Australia, Paskaia has partnered with MASTA, the territorial authority of local indigenous groups to co-design an approach that involves marginalised groups in every decision. The project reforests and restores degraded lands with native species, while working to ensure community empowerment and lasting environmental impact.

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Paskaia is a Sweden-based nonprofit organisation whose name means “building for the future” in the Miskito language. Paskaia envisions a thriving, sustainable future for the indigenous Miskito communities of La Mosquitia, Honduras. Through high-quality carbon credits, community-driven restoration, and sustainable agroforestry, they transform degraded landscapes into flourishing ecosystems. By building capacity in the local area with stable incomes, improved food security, and community-led stewardship, they hope to create lasting resilience against climate change.

• Carbon is stored in the platned trees for 20 years, after which it's managed in a sustainable forestry system to help build economic resilience in the community. The carbon will remained stored in durable, high-quality timber products.
• Older trees are preserved to allow for natural restoration and to maintain the forest's biodiversity and ecological value.
• A buffer pool of 12.2% is kept to reduce the risk of carbon reversal.
• Carbon finance funds the extensive fire management plans that enable forest regeneration, reduce overall wildfire risk, and remove key technical, ecological, and social barriers.
• 61% of the revenue generated from carbon credit sales will be receive by the community. Of which, 11% is invested into a community development fund for education, job opportunities, and financial management training to local council leaders).
• By utilising native and naturalised species, the project restores the surrounding habitat and improves the ecosystems to its natural state.
• Restoring the grasslands to its natural forest state, will reduce the risk of soil erosion and increase the organic matter in soils.
• Project's monitoring and methodology is in compliance with Plan Vivo and is audited by AENOR Confía S.A.U.
• While Honduras has social and geopolitical risk, the project has mitigated this risk by co-designing the project with the community and partnering with MASTA, a local organisation for indigenous rights.

After the Miskito had regained collective title to their lands, Magnus Bergström was in La Mosquitia salvaging sunken logs that, after each rain, jammed rivers and cut villages off. Honduran law demands any exported timber be replaced, so mahogany and cedar were planted around churches, clinics and schools. When those seedlings thrived, the community turned to scaling up the return of the whole forest. Restoring thousands of hectares required serious capital—sparking the idea of funding large-scale, community-led recovery through high-integrity carbon offsets.

“Now we have a shared vision as a people… to bring back the pines.”
– Charles Alexander Wood, Miskito project participant

Paskaia began with the Miskito people’s wish to restore their land, reviving a vast connected landscape and turning barren savanna into forest. Co-designed with researchers, a rotating fire brigade provides jobs and income so every willing family benefits. The project’s structure directs 61 % of carbon-credit revenue back to local Miskito communities for wages and village projects, ensuring biodiversity gains translate into lasting social benefit.

The Mosquitia pine-savannah initiative is certified by Plan Vivo.