How can California solve its water woes? By flooding its best farmland.

A floodplain restoration project in California’s Central Valley is preventing flooding, replenishing groundwater, and providing habitat for wildlife. Most of the restoration work involved rewilding the land after removing the berms that protected the area from flooding when it was an agricultural field.

Instead of building hard seawalls to protect communities from hurricanes, some are turning to “living shorelines.” These are made out of crushed rock or oyster shells that are placed offshore in front of a wetland. There are more than 120 of these types of habitats — including in Beaufort, North Carolina — and they have shown that they can absorb 50 percent of wave energy, which can reduce the risk of loss of human life and property from flooding. This might not work for all coastal communities, but living shorelines are cheaper than the traditional seawalls.

In Bangladesh's Chittagong Hill Tracts, conservationist Mahfuz Ahmed Russel is reviving dying streams by building artificial ponds that harvest rainwater to use in streambeds during dry seasons. Over seven years, aquatic life and vegetation have begun to repopulate and streambeds have remained wet throughout the dry season.

Sections of the massive network of wetlands in Colombo, Sri Lanka, went from being overwhelmed by garbage to biodiverse ecosystems that are a critical part of urban planning and flood prevention. The government and community groups worked to clean them up, and keep them clean, so the wetlands can do what they’re naturally good at.

Local farmers, government officials, and nonprofits, including the faith-based conservation organization A Rocha Canada, partnered to prevent further loss of land due to flooding. They planted fast-growing plants, like willow and cottonwood shoots, into the eroded bank to replicate the ecosystem before agriculture and development cleared the land. The method — low-tech riparian restoration – is a cost-effective approach that has mitigated land erosion due to flooding. The project also helped to bridge longstanding divides between participants.

Bangs Circular practices sustainable beekeeping across eight communities, launching the Tiwai Honey Project, which builds hand-made beehives to support the native bee population. This practice allows beekeepers to closely monitor the bees’ well-being, thus leading to more honey production and reforestation efforts. So far, the group has trained more than 400 local beekeepers.

In Spain's Bay of Cádiz, locals have spent years collaborating with universities, scientists, and government entities to restore their bay's traditional salt marshes. The results? A revived economic sector, a community adapted to rising sea levels, and protected migratory birds.

Menominee tribal members are practicing methods of forest management that blend both conservation and Indigenous culture to preserve the viability of the forest long-term. In 2018, it was found that after a century of logging on the reservation, the forest had higher tree volume, higher rates of regeneration, more plant diversity and fewer invasive species than other, nontribal forests.

Farmers in West Bengal, India, are swapping rice for bananas to save on expenses and labor and adapt to increasingly erratic monsoons and rainfall impacting yields. The farmers use solar panels and drip irrigation setups funded by the state government to reduce emissions and minimize water loss, as bananas require a lot of water.

The Decolonizing Wealth Project is a network of people working together to create more equitable, capital opportunities for communities of color, with an emphasis on Indigenous land keepers. Through its work with other groups, the project offers a series of grant opportunities like the Indigenous Earth Fund to provide Indigenous-led organizations with the resources needed to target climate and conservation issues.