Regenerant Catalunya Maps
Ways to contribute
A mockup of a possible section — a sketch showing the main areas of contributing to regeneration in Catalunya, as inspiration for possible developments. Each area comes with a few examples of mapped entities.
There is no single door to regeneration in Catalunya — the field is organised as a network of hundreds of environmental, agroecological and cooperative entities, and each one opens its own way in. The closest thing to a shared front door is the Xarxa per a la Conservació de la Natura (XCN): the network of 205 conservation entities that collectively steward 41,744 hectares and publish around 1,000 volunteer actions a year. XCN splits its front door in two — voluntariatambiental.cat for time, and donantambiental.cat for money. Everything else (citizen science, land stewardship, cooperative finance, public aid) runs through the specific programme or entity.
Time — volunteering
Hands-on work: one-off actions or long-term commitments, from beach clean-ups to forest stays.
Catalunya's volunteer infrastructure is organised around the Portal de Voluntariat Ambiental, which aggregates one-off actions and long-term positions from environmental entities across the territory — filterable by duration, audience (schools, companies), citizen science, protected natural areas and wildlife recovery centres. The park volunteer tables (e.g. Terres de l'Ebre, Ports, Delta de l'Ebre) and the wildlife centres (Torreferrussa, Vallcalent, Aiguamolls de l'Empordà) run stable programmes tied to specific places. Corporate volunteering is handled explicitly by the portal and by the XCN.
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The central volunteer marketplace: filter by duration (one-off / long-term), audience (schools, companies), citizen science, protected natural areas and wildlife centres. Contact: info@voluntariatambiental.cat.
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XCN's own volunteer gateway into the same network of 205 entities.
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Seed-collective cooperative; runs an annual volunteer call for its Jornada Gastronòmica de les Plantes Oblidades (120+ activities).
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Agroecology cooperative with projects in several comarques: territorial dynamization, farmer support, research and advocacy.
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Environmental association with long-running volunteer programmes.
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Social and environmental platform defending public water; volunteer actions linked to water defence.
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Permaculture school offering courses and hands-on volunteering.
Attention — citizen science & monitoring
A lighter, distributed way to contribute: observations and measurements that feed real research and management.
Citizen-science schemes turn attention into data. Most require short training but no sustained presence: you observe, photograph or measure, and the results feed monitoring programmes used by researchers and public managers. Examples run from bat acoustics and butterfly transects to river sampling and coastal bioblitzes (BioMARató). Several are hosted or driven by entities already mapped on this site. Cetacean photo-identification outings (Associació Cetàcea) are a sea-going variant.
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The Spanish node of the global iNaturalist network, driven by CREAF (mapped on this site): photograph any species and the observations flow into GBIF.
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Bat monitoring platform (Granollers Natural Sciences Museum): acoustic surveys, roost censuses, river transects, nest-boxes and advanced working groups.
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Hosts the Catalan Butterfly Monitoring Scheme (butterfly transects), the bat platform, SEMICE (small mammals) and the Liró project.
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Volunteer river monitoring by Associació Hàbitats: sample water and riparian life; results published yearly; training and donations welcomed.
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Landscape Observatory of Catalunya: participatory landscape observation and citizen initiatives feeding landscape policy.
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Coastal bioblitz run by the Institut de Ciències del Mar (ICM-CSIC), listed every year on the volunteer portal.
Money & capital — donations, philanthropy & cooperative finance
From one-off gifts to cooperative banking — align your giving, savings and consumption with the regenerative economy.
Two rails for giving: the dedicated environmental donation platform (donantambiental.cat — choose a project by habitat) and direct giving to any entity registered in the Registre d'Entitats de Medi Ambient, which unlocks the 15% Catalan income-tax deduction (Llei 16/2008, art. 34). Beyond donations, regeneration needs patient capital: cooperative savings-and-loans (Coop57), a cooperative ethical bank (Fiare Banca Etica) and energy cooperatives (Som Energia) anyone can join with a capital contribution. Public instruments exist for organisations — the ICF's Ecoverda green loans and Coop57's sector loans — and switching consumption (energy, banking, insurance) through the XES Mercat Social is the lowest-threshold form of this modality.
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Donate to a specific project by habitat (terrestrial, aquatic, marine-coastal, fauna, other) via PayPal, BIZUM (code 03963) or bank transfer; 200+ entities participate.
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XCN's donation gateway into the same network of conservation entities.
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Official register (Decret 2/2022): check that an entity is registered — the requirement for the 15% deduction — and download the data as open data.
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Civic crowdfunding with donation certificates and a fiscal calculator; matchfunding convocatories such as Arrela't Alt Pirineu i Aran and Arrela't Delta de l'Ebre multiply citizen contributions with public money.
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The classic curated list of NGO projects seeking support (Donant Ambiental campaign).
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Recurring membership sustains the seed collective; its Singulars project raised €2.5M in a recent investment round.
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Membership sustains the network and its coordination role (205 entities, 41,744 ha under stewardship).
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Cooperative ethical finance: become a member (person or entity), put savings to work in the social economy, or request financing. New guarantee agreements with the European Investment Fund (InvestEU).
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Cooperative ethical bank: 110,000+ clients and 47,000+ socios in Spain/Italy; zero financing of fossil fuels or arms; deposits fund positive-impact projects.
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Renewable energy cooperative, 87,480 socias: join with a capital contribution, switch your contract, or invest in shared generation (Generation kWh).
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The 100% public electricity marketer of Barcelona and its metropolitan area: switching supplier is an immediate, cost-free contribution.
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The solidarity-economy network and its Mercat Social: route consumption, finance and services through ESS entities.
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Catalan public finance institute: green loans (Ecoverda, up to €5M / 20 years) and sector loans for primary, social and sustainability projects.
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Impact investor mapped on this site: cooperative finance for agriculture, energy and inclusion worldwide, with a strong cooperative base.
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Venture philanthropy and impact acceleration for social innovation in Catalonia and Spain.
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Quality seal for cooperative local energy communities — the entry point for joining or creating one.
Land — custody & long-term commitment
Catalunya's land-conservation mechanism: agreements, inventories and public funds to take land out of speculative use.
Land stewardship (custòdia del territori) is the main Catalan instrument for private-land conservation: an entity and a landowner sign an agreement to manage the estate for conservation, restoration or cultural value. The XCN network keeps the inventory (796 active initiatives, 41,744 ha, ~1.3% of the territory) and an interactive map. The Catalan government funds stewardship programmes and, since 2025, a €5M fund for nonprofits, municipalities and consortia to buy estates with community-interest habitats — the first acquisition (Fundació Alive, Empordà ponds) was announced in July 2026. The water agency runs 30 river-custody agreements.
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Official gateway: the stewardship concept, aid programmes, the custody inventory and its cartographic viewer, and private natural areas.
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The network of custody entities: 205 members, 41,744 ha under stewardship, and the biennial inventory of 796 initiatives. The place to find a custody partner if you own or manage land.
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River-restoration overview: 30 river-custody agreements, connectivity works, LIFE Alnus, and grant lines for riparian entities.
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First acquisition under the new finques purchase fund: a property to restore the Empordà ponds. See the news section on the XCN homepage.
Organizations & companies
Corporate volunteering, sponsorship, procurement and tax-efficient giving — the institutional routes.
Companies can register volunteering days through the same volunteer portal — its "companies" filter is explicit — make tax-efficient donations under Llei 49/2002 (corporate income tax, on top of the regional regime), or sponsor events and programmes. The XCN maintains a dedicated companies gateway. Institutions can multiply citizen donations through Goteo's matchfunding convocatories, and public bodies have their own aid lines (custody grants, the finques fund, river-custody grants).
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Dedicated gateway for companies: volunteering, sponsorship and collaboration with the network.
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The portal explicitly handles corporate volunteering requests, not only individual ones.
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Institutions and companies multiply citizen donations through matchfunding convocatories (€1.1M already matched).
The tax route
If you are a tax resident in Catalunya, donations to entities registered in the Registre d'Entitats de Medi Ambient are 15% deductible on the regional income tax (Llei 16/2008, art. 34; cap of 5% of the tax quota), on top of any state-level deduction under Llei 49/2002. A Catalan patronage law currently in the legislative pipeline could raise these limits — micro-donations up to €250 could become up to 95% deductible. Goteo issues donation certificates and provides a fiscal calculator for its campaigns.
How to choose
Match the modality to your time horizon, your assets and your appetite. A practical rule of thumb:
A free afternoon
Filter 'one-off activities' on the volunteer portal — beach clean-ups, planting days — or open Natusfera and contribute from anywhere.
An ongoing commitment
Long-term volunteering in a protected area or wildlife centre, or become a member (soci) of an entity or cooperative.
You prefer observation to shovels
Citizen science: bats, butterflies, rivers, species photography — short training, no fixed schedule.
Money, one-off or recurring
One-off: donantambiental.cat or a crowdfunding round (check the 15% deduction first). Recurring: membership of an entity or cooperative.
You own or manage land
Sign a stewardship agreement with a custody entity in the XCN network, or work with entities using the finques purchase fund.
You are an organization or company
Corporate volunteering, matchfunding, ICF or Coop57 financing, and EU programmes (LIFE, Horizon Europe) for larger restoration projects.