Growing Knowledge & Building Partnerships

By Andrés Varona, Program Officer - A griculture & Food Security Through the manufacturing of educational kits, DIDART is a small Guatemalan enterprise that teaches children about the cultural heritage of the country. In order to spur community development, DIDARD purchases the materials that go into their kits directly from rural artisans from across Guatemala. Since 2015, Partner of the Americas’ Farmer-to-Farmer (F2F) program has been sending volunteers in order to assist the company with various organizational, financial, and sales aspects of their enterprise. In the latest F2F assignment, Kate Senn traveled to Guatemala City in order to support DIDART with a series of digital branding and online marketing efforts. In preparation for her F2F assignment, Kate  reviewed DIDART’s websites and social media platforms as well as identified areas that could help her draft a “Social Media Strategy Handbook” for the small company. Upon her arrival in Guatemala on August...

One of the newest hosts that Partners’ Farmer-to-Farmer program has been working with is FADCANIC ( Fundación para la Autonomía y el Desarrollo de la Costa Atlántica de Nicaragua ). FADCANIC is a civil society organization based in the two autonomous regions of Nicaragua’s Atlantic Coast (e.g. RAAS and RAAN). Partners of the Americas began working with FADCANIC in mid-2016. Since then, the relationship has already proven fruitful. FADCANIC was founded in 1990 after a government statute recognized the autonomy of the Atlantic coastal regions of Nicaragua. FADCANIC’s mission is to support the autonomy of these areas by improving the livelihoods of its inhabitants. FADCANIC achieve these through two different educational centers: 1) the Center for Agroforestry (Centro Agroforestal or “CAF”) and 2) the Center for Environmental and Agroforestry Education (Centro Educación Técnica Ambiental y Agroforestal or “CEAA”. Through these centers, FADCANIC offers free three-year technical prog...

During the last four years of the USAID-funded Farmer-to-Farmer (F2F) program, Partners of the Americas has been actively working to strengthen the production and organizational capacity of numerous women and youth-based groups in Nicaragua. As with other country-specific F2F projects, the “Women&Youth” project in Nicaragua relies on the mutual collaboration of a myriad of local agricultural cooperatives, foundations, as well as educational institutions. Among these various entities, Partners will like to take the opportunity to recognize the work of our local host, Fabretto Foundation. With their HQ in Managua and field offices throughout the country, Fabretto’s mission is to ensure that children, families and communities in the most disadvantaged areas of Nicaragua, reach their full potential and improve their future opportunities through educational and nutritional programs. Currently, Fabretto implements an innovative high school program called SAT (Tutorial Learning System...

On August 21st, Partners of the Americas’ Agriculture & Food Security (AFS) team had the opportunity to attend a ceremony at the historic Hall of the Americas in Washington, D.C. The event was centered around the launch of a new collaborative report between the the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the International Fund for Agricultural Development, the International Organization for Migration (IOM), the Organization of American States (OAS) and the World Food Programme (WFP), titled “ Food Security and Emigration: Why People Flee and the Impact on Family Members Left Behind in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras ”. As the title of the document shows, the report was focused on the food-related factors that prompt people from Central America’s Northern Triangle region to migrate to other countries, mainly the United States. As the international development organization in charge of implementing the USAID-funded Farmer-to-Farmer (F2F) program in Latin America and the Cari...

By Young W. Park, Ph. D., F2F Volunteer While sometimes overlooked, goat milk can be an important source of essential nutrients and animal-based proteins for the people of developing countries. During the last four decades, the reputation of the dairy goat has been changing and is now has become a vital member of the world dairy industry. The FAO statistics (2001) have shown that goat milk makes up 55% of all milk consumed in Bangladesh, 51% in Somalia, 24% in Iran, and 16% in Sudan, demonstrating the significance and nutritional value that goat milk has for emerging economies. The world statistics of goat milk production also shows a 62% increase from 1993 to 2013 or from 11 to 18 million metric tons, with France, Spain, Turkey and Greece leading in tonnage in that order. To my knowledge, there has been no comprehensive statistics on how much goat milk has been produced or how many small dairy goat producers are currently working in Guatemala. Currently in Guatemala, there ...

By F2F Volunteer Don Schultz  Guatemala is known as the “Land of Eternal Spring” for its year-round mild climate, one that is ideal for the production of many horticultural and floral crops. Many farms of all sizes have succeeded in creating an export market, shipping principally to the United States and Europe. The buyers demand high quality plant material that is free of pests and diseases. However, the export industry is challenged to maintain a modern integrated pest management (IPM) standard within Guatemala’s limited institutional and government support. Some of the farms also have a pesticide safety culture that is behind the standards of the countries to which they export their plants. It is into this state of affairs that I ventured during my volunteer assignment with Farmer to Farmer (F2F). My two week assignment seemed barely long enough to simply gain some understanding of the situation, so I knew beforehand I would be challenged to accomplish my goals. Notw...

By Megan Roberts, F2F Volunteer  Greetings from northern Nicaragua! My name is Megan Roberts, and I have just concluded two weeks as a Farmer-to-Farmer (F2F) volunteer with Partners for the Americas. Farmer-to-Farmer is a USAID-funded program that connects specialized agriculturalists from the United States with farmers, cooperatives, agribusinesses, extension services, government agencies and other institutions in Latin America and beyond. For this assignment, Fabretto Foundation ( https://fabretto.org/ ) hosted me on location. Over the past two weeks, Fabretto Foundation coordinated workshops where I participated in teaching beginning farm financial recordkeeping to farmers and students, with the help of Fabretto tutors, in several communities in the Department of Madriz. I also participated in two train-the-trainer activities with Fabretto tutors, staff, and directors. Back in the United States I recently was hired by the University of Minnesota as an Extension Educat...

Back in February 2017, longtime Farmer-to-Farmer (F2F) volunteer Robert Sterk returned to Haiti to lead various beekeeping seminars in and around Port-au-Prince.  During this apiculture-oriented assignment, Mr. Sterk also worked alongside SAKALA, an F2F host, to establish community apiaries where local farmers and youth groups could be trained on various beehive management methods and techniques. Given the impact of the first assignment had on these communities, he decided to return to once more to Haiti in July 2017 in order to build on the progress that had been made.   Upon arriving in Port-au-Prince, Mr. Sterk prepared and led a series of beekeeping workshops with SAKALA associated farmers. These included a series of hands-on trainings related to 1) bee biology, 2) colony health inspections, 2) varroa mite testing with sugar roll, as well as 3) treatment strategies. He also had the opportunity to travel to several communities outside the capital. In the community o...

Agriculture and Food Security Programs Outreach and Communications Internship Partners of the Americas, a nonprofit organization engaged in development programs in the Western Hemisphere, seeks an intern to support its Agriculture and Food Security (AFS) team. The AFS team manages USAID programs focused on agriculture, economic development, nutrition, and natural resource management. AFS works primarily in the countries of Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, Guatemala and Haiti. Internship Description Qualified candidates must be able to work a minimum of 15-20 hours per week. AFS intern responsibilities include but are not limited to: §   Draft and disseminate press releases to relevant media outlets ( primary responsibility ) §   Assist in drafting and posting blog stories each week; §   Assist in managing AFS social media accounts (i.e., Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.) §   Assist with drafting brochures, newsletter articles and other public ...

By F2F Volunteer Peter Phillips Micro-watershed that feeds into the Yaque del Norte River system During June 2017, I spent two weeks in the Dominican Republic with the goal of training Dominican colleagues on themes related to water conservation and water quality. The majority of my assignment was focalized in the Arroyo Gurabo micro-watershed of the Yaque del Norte River in and near the city of Santiago in the Cibao Valley. My host agency was a local NGO, Asociación para el Desarrollo Integral (APEDI), and my faithful guide was Partners of the Americas’ Farmer-to-Farmer (F2F) field officer, José Alejandro Almodóvar Gómez. The Yaque del Norte is the longest river on the island of Hispaniola. Extending for more than 200 km, the river originates in the high mountains of the Cordillera Central of the Dominican Republic and discharges in the northwest of the country not far from Haitian border. Santiago is the second largest city in the country and is located at the midpoint al...