Addressing conservation challenges through female entrepreneurship: A paradigm shift

WNPS PLANT, Otter Fonds from Netherlands and the Lanka Environmental Fund joined hands to empower Female Entrepreneurs to commence their own forest plant nurseries through a powerful groundbreaking initiative recently.

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Justice Shirani Tilakawardene who will deliver the November WNPS lecture.

The final awarding and agreement signing was held with the female recipients and the WNPS and PLANT teams, along with the donor representatives, on the 23d of October 2025 at the WNPS head office. The WNPS once again pioneered a fresh thought process by making major infusions into Community aspects and entrepreneurship as a bridge for its conservation endeavours.

With a vision to develop forest corridors and unify fragmented forests through private sector engagement, the WNPS (www.wnpssL.org ) set up Preserving Land and Nature (Guarantee) Ltd, (PLANT) a few years ago (wwwplantsl.org). The initiative gained rapid momentum thanks to a very focused approach, multiple partner engagements, and a passionate team, but soon hit a massive roadblock. The long forest corridors being created in the hills needed way more montane plants than were readily available. Species are carefully selected by the teams and with no precedent of large-scale reforesting in the hills, the existing few nurseries were unable to cater to the demands. The slow growth rate of montane plants provided yet another challenge. The leadership went for a bold plan for which it sought willing donors.

The idea was multidimensional: seek out female talent who would be passionate about conservation, fund them at the start up stages, train them extensively in forest nursery management and entrepreneurship to make them best in class, make it an exclusive female-led initiative, part subsidize their capital costs so that the returns would be faster and provide a safety net by purchasing the output. The projects will accelerate the creation of several successful and profitable ventures which would not just address the conservation challenge at hand but also bring social stability and a financial infusion into multiple families within rural society.