This is our story

山东 徐英杰

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难词探意

1. innovative /΄ɪnəveɪtɪv/ adj. 创新的

2. version /΄vзːʃn/ n. 版本

3. core /kɔː(r)/ adj. 核心的

In 2015, a group of graduate students at UC Berkeley's Haas School of Business identified a lack of financing as the primary barrier to adequate forest restoration in California. Concerned about the damaging effects of wildfire to communities and wildlife,the group developed aninnovativefinancial model that would raise funds for forest restoration activities.

With this model, then called the “Blue Forest Conservation Notes”, the group entered a global competition called Kellogg-Morgan Stanley Sustainable Investing Challenge. Out of 129 teams from around the world, the earlyversionof the Forest Resilience Bond （FRB）, won first place.

But getting the FRB off the ground and proving it worked wasn't a paved road.Taking the model from a competition to real life was a learning process—a journey of trial and error—for the team. Selling more conservative groups on such a new idea comes with many challenges and while the concept of restoration bonds isn't new, Blue Forest has been the first to successfully deliver the model to the market.

According to co-founder and managing partner, Zach Knight, the difference and “secret sauce” in Blue Forest's success has been listening—which is also one of the organization's core values. The group listened to feedback from the community, soon-to-be partners, and others who had previously developed similar models that had been unsuccesful.

After winning the competition, the founding members and the model began to draw attention and started developing a network, establishing important and valuable relationships with groups who believed in them and the FRB. Three years later and Blue Forest successfully launched its first FRB project in 2018. The Yuba Project provides $4 million in private capital to finance critical restoration treatments across 15,000 acres of the Tahoe National Forest. The Yuba Project's first successful work season was completed in the fall of 2019.

Blue Forest and its partners continue to make progress on the Yuba Project and are in the early development stages of a second project on the Tahoe National Forest. The development team is also thrilled to be expanding across California and the Western US, developing Forest Resilience Bond projects to help increase the pace and scale of restoration in other places.

Reading

Check

1. Why did the group develop the financial model?

A. To set up a big company.

B. To raise money for forest conservation.

C. To collect advice for forest conservation.

D. To participate in a famous competition.

2. What's the key to Blue Forest's success?

A. Public support.

B. Successful planning.

C. Government's help.

D. Sincere listening.

3. When did Blue Forest start its first FRB project?

A. In 2015. B. In 2016.

C. In 2018. D. In 2019.

Language

Study

Difficult sentence

But getting the FRB off the ground and proving it worked wasn't a paved road. 但是，让FRB顺利开始并证明它是有效的，并不容易。

【点石成金】该句的getting the FRB off the ground and proving it worked为动名词形式作主语，wasn't为谓语部分；get something off the ground 意为“（使）顺利开始；开始发生”。

Cultural

Background

Blue Forest

Blue Forest是一个非营利组织，为应对紧迫的环境挑战制订可持续的金融解决方案，以降低灾难性野火的风险。