What does restoration truly mean when seen through the eyes of the communities living it every day? This plenary brings together community leaders, restoration practitioners and youth changemakers from Uganda, Senegal, Chad, and Kenya to unpack the word “restoration” from the ground up. Moving beyond global frameworks and project cycles, the panelists reveal that restoration is already happening at the grassroots level, driven not by external funding but by community ownership, land tenure security, and the economics of living with the land. The plenary closes with a powerful question – what becomes possible when political will, finance, and narrative power are placed directly in the hands of the people whose lives depend on the landscapes they are already restoring?