Growing Knowledge & Building Partnerships

Source: ISA As part of the USAID-funded Farmer-to-Farmer (F2F) program in the Caribbean basin, the Agriculture & Food Security (AFS) team at Partners of the Americas has been leading a project to increase climate change resilience across several vulnerable communities in the Dominican Republic. In order to carry out these efforts, Partners works with a wide array of host organizations ranging from agricultural cooperatives, nonprofits, as well as local universities. Among the multiple Dominican institutions of higher learning with which we work is worth highlighting one: Universidad ISA. In 1962, this institution was founded as the Instituto Superior de Agricultura or ISA. ISA was established by a partnership between USAID, the Asociación para el Desarrollo, Inc. (APEDI) and the national government of the Dominican Republic. The university is located in a large rural campus just outside of Santiago de Caballeros, the country’s second largest metropolitan area. Universidad...

Wayne Burleson with local farmers From March 12-26, 2017, Wayne and Connie Burleson travelled to Nicaragua to complete two separate and very distinct assignments. Wayne, a retired range scientist and land management consultant, provided training in rotational grazing, through the use of electric fencing, to technicians and producers of the National Cattleman’s Commission of Nicaragua (CONAGAN) and the Nicaragua Chamber of Beef Industry Exports (CONICARNE), both based in the capital city of Managua. Meanwhile, his wife, Connie conducted workshops on composting, gardening, and sustainable crop management to children and students in the communities of Nueva Guinea and Camoapa. While the pair worked separately throughout most of their trip, their work overlapped in the city of Camoapa, a region known for its large cattle production and home to the Hogar Luceros del Amanecer , a semi-residential program ran by the Sunrise Foundation to provide educational and social services to youth in...

Source: RCN This week in the Department of Meta, one of a dozen conflict hotspots across Colombia, President Juan Manual Santos inaugurated a revamped effort by the national government to curb the growing of coca leafs—the main ingredient in cocaine production. Historically, previous government-led initiatives have focused primarily in the eradication of coca yields through the spraying of glyphosate, an herbicide proven to cause various forms of cancer and ecological degradation. While these spraying initiatives have barely decreased the total production of coca leaf, they have caused significant harm to farmers, the licit crops they grow for food and sustenance, as well as the surrounding environment in which these rural households live and work. Faced with this impending economic, health and environmental situation, many farmers have had to leave their lands altogether or have even returned to growing coca, a crop that is oftentimes more profitable than cultivating legal cro...

From January 24 to February 5, Dr. William Terry Kelley was in the Dominican Republic as part of a  Farmer-to-Farmer (F2F) assignment. During his trip, Dr. Kelly  traveled to  La Vega Province  where he assisted smallholder chayote (tayota) producers in adapting sustainable soil management and fertilization techniques.  Farmers in the Jarabacoa region of the province are currently producing Tayota (primarily Sechium edule ) on slopes approaching 40% with a raised trellis system. While this crop is profitable for these growers and is therefore economically viable, the production system that they employ is not sustainable for the soil nor the surrounding environment.   Since  the growers do not use any type of ground cover under the canopy of the crop, most chayote field suffered from high levels of soil erosion.  While most growers have adequate chemical options for traditional insect and disease control, many of them utili...

Written By: Leah Tewksbury, F2F Volunteer In Guatemala, it is volcanic soil we’re talking about, and basically nothing beats volcanic soil. Period. Volcanic materials break down and weather to form some of the most fertile soils on Earth. Volcanic soils produce, arguably, the finest coffee, tea, grapes for wine, fruit, and vegetables in the world. Lucky for Guatemala, it has countless volcanoes that have provided amazing soils for its people, in addition to showcasing some of the most beautiful natural scenery in Central America. I was fortunate to be assigned to work with vegetable growers near Antigua, Guatemala and got a firsthand look at how productive and fertile volcanic soils can be. Since my vegetable farm in Pennsylvania is situated on a mountain of shale, and fertility has always been an ongoing endeavor, it was impressive to see such high quality soils producing vast amounts of vegetables (primarily conventionally-grown carrots, snow peas, green beans, and zucchinis for ...

One of the many agricultural lecture/workshops at Chuya Yaku.  This was the farm of Abel Canelos and Yolanda Vargas Written by: Rip Winkel, F2F Volunteer This is the second report on my Partners of the Americas' USAID-funded Farmer-to-Farmer (F2F) volunteer assignment to Puyo Ecuador. In the first report, I outlined my schedule, and explained a bit of what the purpose of the project was about. In this second article, I would like to detail a little more on the work done, the communities and some of the folks that I was fortunate enough to get to know. And as stated before, I feel privileged to have been able to work this project for Farmer-to-Farmer program. Each week that I was in Ecuador, it seemed that there was less and less time to get things done.  In Chuya Yaku, where the majority of the work was conducted, 8 out of 10 farms in this Kichwa territory participated in the trainings and workshops. The size of the groups attending these sessions ranged any...