People often ask were we send all of the donated shoes we receive. Well, the MORE Foundation takes these shoes to Ghana and Honduras and sells them at major metro areas to vendors who in turn create jobs and help improve the quality of life in these cities. The vast majority of Africans cannot afford new shoes . The proceeds from the sale of the shoes provides training and tools to the poorest rural farmers and supports MORE’s Agroforestry efforts.
MORE’s Agroforestry efforts have the potential to create a huge number of jobs in the region. By reforesting 5% of the land area of Ghana (the size of Oregon) a million jobs would be created and the size of the economy would easily double from 40 billion to 80 billion a year. Three billion trees would have a value of half a trillion USD.
Each farm we supply 1,000 trees to increases in value to over $100,000 USD in 10 years. One acre with 1,000 trees will be worth $100,000 USD. This is a 1,000% increase in income for the subsistence farmer. The used athletic shoes you collect provide 100% of the funding for this program. Every shoe your store collects pulls down one ton of carbon.
You are the change that must happen. This year 360,000 trees will sequester over 150,000 tons of carbon within 10 years and another 200,000 across 20 years. We could easily reach one million tons annually with only one million pair of used athletic shoes. Every 100 pair of used athletic shoes creates another job and strengthens democracy.
So keep on donating those shoes people!