In May 2025, Global Mangrove Trust (GMT) was honored to host members of the UBS Climate Collective in Medan, Indonesia. The visit offered a powerful opportunity to deepen relationships, ground abstract climate goals in lived community experience, and collectively reimagine what inclusive, data-driven blue carbon work can achieve.
The UBS Climate Collective delegation included 16 participants, comprising UBS staff and clients, joined by field partners from different regions. GMT, alongside our long-term local partner YAGASU, led immersive site engagements and facilitated connections between UBS clients and coastal communities. Our focus: showcasing how rigorous restoration, inclusive community structures, and advanced monitoring tools can come together to deliver real climate impact.
From Planting to People: Experiencing Blue Carbon on the Ground
One of the visit’s defining moments was a mangrove planting ceremony in Pulau Sembilan. UBS clients traveled by coast guard boats to a remote planting site where they engaged directly with the land, the mud, and the people driving restoration forward. The activity gave participants a visceral sense of the effort, complexity, and coordination required to restore degraded coastlines.
The visit also brought clients into close contact with the people behind the projects. In Langkat, guests met with women-led cooperatives and local youth who are the backbone of GMT’s regeneration and GearBank programs. Products like natural-dyed batik, coastal crafts, and sustainable fishery tools were displayed, and community members spoke candidly about their livelihoods, aspirations, and leadership roles in environmental stewardship. A live translator helped bridge language gaps, ensuring meaningful dialogue.
Vision, Integrity, and Momentum
Throughout the visit, UBS clients expressed appreciation for the balance of technical credibility and community connection that defines GMT’s work. They saw how our tools anchor blue carbon projects in data, while our social models center women, youth, and coastal groups as agents of change.
Security and logistics were handled with care—including police and coast guard support and well-orchestrated transitions—which clients acknowledged as a thoughtful gesture of respect and professionalism. This helped create a setting where partners and funders could focus fully on learning and connection.
At the closing lunch event, several UBS clients delivered spontaneous remarks, praising the field visit as one of the most grounded and inspiring experiences they had encountered through the Climate Collective. Many noted how this year’s visit gave them a deeper understanding of the scale and social texture of the work they’re supporting.
Continuing Support, Shared Commitment
UBS’s ongoing support, including a recent commitment to GMT’s GearBank initiative, reflects a shared belief in financing solutions that are scalable, measurable, and rooted in frontline communities. This visit reinforced that trust and seeded new ideas for how storytelling, transparency, and community co-creation can define the next era of climate finance.
As GMT expands its work in Aceh and beyond, we remain grateful to UBS and our collective partners for investing not just in carbon, but in people, relationships, and long-term transformation.
