Viviana Solange Yanez Gomez is the force behind 18,000 Trees in Ecuador, a country famous for its incredible biodiversity, cities, and landscapes.

Although Viviana grew up surrounded by nature–hiking mountains and forests, she simultaneously watched these ecosystems get damaged. That early experience sparked her path toward conservation.

After graduation, she worked in environmental education with children on Ecuador’s coast, learning firsthand the power of community-driven solutions.

Today, she leads 18000 Trees, 18000 Puembeños, a community-led urban reforestation project in Puembo, Quito. Their goal? To plant 18,000 trees–one for every resident–over six years, restoring ecosystems, creating habitats, reconnecting green spaces, and building climate resilience. By linking parks, ravines, and neighborhoods through bio-corridors, the project boosts biodiversity, cleans air and water, and even cools the city. And it’s all rooted in community work, youth and women engagement, and environmental education.

Viviana is also an alum of CoalitionWILD’s EXCELerator FLEX program. With applications for the 2026 EXCELerator program opening on October 27th and running through November 24th, we thought there couldn’t be a better time to sit down and chat with such an inspiring individual. For those who don’t know, the EXCELerator program is a six-month intensive program that trains emerging conservation leaders to turn ideas into real-world action projects.

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