In order to purchase land for use by its members, the Heiveld formed the Three Fountains Trust. The Trust is a not-for-profit whose main object is:
to facilitate the access to land by members of the co-operative, particularly by those members who are disadvantaged relative to the other members because they do not own or have the use of agricultural land sufficient for their needs, and having particular regard for the need of women members to obtain access to the land.
The Trust is supported by the Heiveld, and run by 5 trustees: Pieter Koopman, Leon Koopman and Laurence Dworkin are members of the Co-operative, Rhoda Malgas is a lecturer at the University of Stellenbosch, and Noel Oettlé works for the Environmental Monitoring Group (EMG). Rhoda undertook ground-breaking participatory research on wild rooibos with members of the Heiveld, and has a long and close association with the Cooperative and its members. EMG has worked closely with the Heiveld since it was founded, and has expertise in land and biodiversity conservation, business development and conservation area management. The trustees were selected by the Heiveld, and collectively have many years of experience that is relevant to managing conserved land, participatory development, rooibos production, enterprise development, scientific research, adaptation to climate change and sound governance.
The Trust has also been mandated by the Heiveld to provide education and training for members of the co-operative and for the community, promote the sustainable use of the land, promote eco-tourism, make land available to new members of the co-operative and promote economic development and self-employment in the community.