Progress report for EDS22-41
Project Information
In Puerto Rico, over 90% of food is imported. Furthermore, the last Puerto Rico Agriculture Census (2018) shows that the average age of farmers in our mountainous region is 60+, with most farmers utilizing conventional farming practices that degrade soil quality, increase erosion, and limit biodiversity. There is a need for a new generation of growers that can increase food security in Puerto Rico, create new livelihoods, and improve the health and quality of life for our communities. However, the complexity of the current social, political and economic climate limits opportunities to acquire resources, support and education investments to move forward. Challenges have been exacerbated by the devastation of farms and infrastructure caused by hurricanes in 2017, earthquakes in 2020, and the Covid-19 related economic crisis. The urgency and need is even greater in the marginalized and impoverished communities of the central western mountain region where Plenitud PR is located. Plenitud PR proposed a project that offers an alternative strategic model through the strengthening and expansion of experiential education training and one-on-one programs in agroecology for participants local to the central region. The team of talented agronomists, investigators, and educators involved have led educational programs impacting more than 600 aspiring/beginner farmers over the last 10 years, and have distributed over 5,000 copies of a unique Spanish-language sustainable agriculture book that serves as an educational tool for farmers and home gardeners in the tropics.
Last year’s project evaluation demonstrated that:
- Small-scale sustainable farmers need more intensive mentoring, marketing resources and opportunities in order to successfully launch profitable micro-businesses.
- Consumers need more awareness on the importance of supporting local sustainable farmers and Food Access and Literacy (FAL).
This years project included not only a second iteration of our previous year’s educational programming (5-month apprenticeship program impacting 15-20 beginner farmers, a 6-month mentorship program to impact 1-2 participants, and a 7-month internship program impacting 1-2 beginner farmers), but it will also be expanded to include an Agro-ecological Incubator for Small Businesses for 4 limited-resource and/or women farmers. In this program they received additional market gardening training and efficiency tools; they also gained more technical and legal support at their production sites. This year small sustainable farmers were also provide stipends and resources to be able to take the time to discuss needs and collaboration opportunities and get additional technical support.
Additionally, we expanded our outreach efforts with educational material for both farmers and consumers; we have revised and expand our current educational materials based on feedback from course participants on agricultural practices, crop planning and maintenance tools as well as developed FAL content to increase sales for farmers in the region. We also further tested and and continue to improve the second edition of our Spanish-language sustainable agriculture manual.
Through this project, Plenitud PR sought to deepen impact on beginning farmers through programs that will increase their success and profitability, and through a multi-pronged educational and marketing campaign increasing consumer demand for local produce to advance sustainable agriculture in the region.
1.Offered a 2 part 260-hr. Market Gardening Incubation experience, with the technical assistance of Voz Activa partners, to start up small scale market garden businesses or improve existing operations for 4 limited - resource and/or women farmers who have previously completed our sustainable agriculture training or are partner beginner farmers. They participated of incubation sessions with a stipend to:
- Prepare a full crop plan and business plan with professional assistance
- Receive technical assistance in design and infrastructure development
- Receive the basic tools and materials to begin production
- Receive marketing support and access to the Plenitud PR food hub as an initial or additional sales channel
- Receive financial and legal support
2. Test and improved the second edition of our spanish sustainable agriculture book titled: !Siembra Boricua!: Manual de agricultura en armonía con la naturaleza while continuing to distribute the first edition. In the last 2 years, we tested the first edition of this book and received positive feedback on the need for this tool and its effectiveness. After making the necessary improvements, we are currently completing the second edition and will be testing its effectiveness at supporting farmers in their sustainable agriculture practices. Program participants have received a copy as part of their curriculum and evaluate the content.
3. Test and train beginning farmers with key small scale farm tools that maximize efficiency and economic viability. These training will be included in our educational programing and offered in special workshops for partner farmers and beginner farmers of our incubation program. Tools will include:
- Two wheel tractor with implements (rotary plow, power harrow and flail mower) for easier and sustainable soil preparation.
- Broadforks for more sustainable soil preparation
- Silage tarps used for efficient weed control
- Precision seeders for quicker planting and seed saving
- Stir-up hoes for quicker and ergonomic weeding
- Crop planning templates to simplify planning and organization and intensify small growing spaces for profitability.
Spanish Biofertilizer Recepies
Improved Spanish Crop Planning Tool
4.Small Sustainable Farmer Collaboration Program - We incentivise 4 small scale farmer meet ups with 6 participants to initiate dialogue and collaboration. This was facilitated by our partner Voz Activa, who are professionals facilitating open dialogue, in order to identify needs and opportunities sharing resources and costs. We also reserved funding to catalyze collaborative projects generated from the dialogues and/or technical or legal support needed to advance their efforts. Farmers received a stipend for every gathering attended. We also organize volunteer hours at each farm during the course of the grant to support labor and deepen relationships with the farming community.
With external funding we also continued our previous year’s objectives:
- Developed Food Access and Literacy (FAL) content to increase sales for farmers in the region and improve previously created educational material based on feedback from course participants on agricultural practices, crop planning and maintenance tools. We created social media templates to present simple educational material to the general public and recipes to use with local production.
- Continued our educational programing which includes our apprenticeship, mentorship and internship (Intensive Agroecology training).
- Continued advancing the Plenitud PR farm operation which serves as our main laboratory and educational tool.
These lead and supported the objectives of this project to further sustainable agriculture in Puerto Rico.
Cooperators
- - Technical Advisor
- - Technical Advisor - Producer
- - Producer
- - Technical Advisor
- - Technical Advisor - Producer
- - Technical Advisor - Producer
- - Technical Advisor
Education
Our educational approach is experiential, horizontal and organized in a 3 tier system. This plan of action allows for the participants to have the opportunity to practice hands on skills for a few months and then share them with others (peer to peer), developing leadership skills at the same time.
Our 3 tiers educational model:
Tier 1 - Broader Engagement
These are one day workshops or distribution of educational material like our Agriculture book. In this way we start spreading the word about sustainable agriculture and our educational opportunities. In this tier we are able to meet people/farmers to recruit in our programs.
Tier 2 - Intensive Workshops
These are multi-day workshops as is our Agriculture Apprenticeship where students experience 5 months of practice and theory of how to develop a small scale sustainable production. They prepare and plant a field from scratch and finally get to harvest and process their produce.
Tier 3 - 1-on-1 Mentorship
These include long term 1-on-1 training experience as are our 6-month mentorship and internship and our multiyear Agro-ecological Incubator for Small Business. During these, students get to continue perfecting skills while developing their own projects with guidance of technical advisors and marketing support.
In addition our team members are constantly looking for ways to systematize and simplify tasks for farmers by creating and improving educational tools such as crop plan templates, bio-fertilizer recipe booklets, materials/supplies purchase guidelines, etc.
Regarding educational outreach, we have dedicated much efforts in creating Spanish and easy to digest sustainable agriculture educational material so distribute through social media and printed material such as a our new recipe book using local produce of small farmers.
Educational & Outreach Activities
Participation Summary:
1. 55 Consultations
We are currently working with 5 farmers in our incubator who continually receive consultations on their farming design and practices as they develop their operation. Ag professionals in our team have offered over 25 consultations with the farmers. Legal and Project Design professionals from the organization Voz Activa have offered over 30 consultations on legal matters of their farm businesses and how to develop their business plans.
2. 26 Curricula, Factsheets or Educational Tools
We have being testing and improving our Annual Agro-ecology Apprenticeship curriculum and have completed the new versions of our introductory topic, soils and bio-fertilizers. We have also completed 6 Spanish educational tools including:
- crop maintenance practices guide,
- seed tray prep guide,
- seed buying guide,
- planting distance guide,
- bio-fertilizer recipe booklet,
- recipe book
Tabla de manejo post cosecha.docx
Tabla de distancias de siembra
Plantilla Record de producción
We have also continued to improve our crop plan tool.
Plantilla Tabla Plan de siembra
We have also invested time creating social media templates to continually publish easy to understand Spanish infographics (factsheets). Throughout this year we have completed 16.
3. 29 On-farm demonstrations
We have organized several on farm demonstrations with student groups of different ages.
(20) Annual Agro-ecology Apprenticeship participants completing their practicum hours at our farm (Planting, Harvesting, Composting, Cover crops, Soil Prep, Seed tray Prep, etc.)
(3) Children from schools of our community (Composting, Seed tray prep, Direct seeding, Thinning)
(3) We facilitate a youth group who have started to visit our farm this year monthly to learn and practice sustainable agriculture. They have participated of demonstrations of Composting, Transplanting and Cover Crops.
(3) This year we received 3 service learning groups of students from universities on the US mainland. They participated in demonstrations of composting, perma-beds preparation and propagation practices.
4. 7 Published press articles, newsletters
We have published 5 Spanish/English blogs related to sustainable agriculture and 2 newspaper articles.
5 Blogs:
https://es.plenitudpr.org/blog/las-marias-china-duce
https://es.plenitudpr.org/blog/biofermento-de-consuelda
https://es.plenitudpr.org/blog/aprendiendo-de-los-arboles-de-aguacate
https://es.plenitudpr.org/blog/agricultores-perseverando-en-medio-de-la-crisis-climatica
https://es.plenitudpr.org/blog/convirtiendo-los-problemas-en-oportunidades-con-la-permacultura
Newspaper Articles in "El Nuevo Día"
1. How to manage heat as sustainable farmers
2. Importance of prioritizing local produce for sustainability
5. 10 Tours
We now offer 1 monthly educational tour to showcase our small scale sustainable farm model and offer a farm to table culinary experience.
6. 2 Webinars/ talks/ presentations
We participated in series of virtual presentations showcasing women leaders in sustainable agriculture and also participated in a seed exchange fair where we presented our project and practices.
7. 20 Workshop/Field days
We have offered over 20 workshops/field days for the Annual Agro-ecology Apprenticeship. During 6 months, students have a workshop once a week in which they all participate in the planting, maintaining and harvesting of a their plot while also getting college level theoretical material and discussions.
Learning Outcomes
Pest Management
Biodiversity in Puerto Rico
How to manage passive and active water, Rain Water Harvesting
Seed Management
Soil Management and conservation
How to use small scale agriculture tools
Where to get sustainable agriculture supplies in Puerto Rico
Agriculture in community
Organic Matter importance, nutrient cycling, composting
Crop diversity, rotation, seasons of planting
Sense of balance and independence when able to grow their own food
Bio-fertilizers
Legal matters when developing an agribusiness
Solidarity economy and cooperative systems between small farmers
****Majority of the evaluations have not been completed yet.***
Project Outcomes
Project outcomes are not finalized yet as it is a 2 year project and evaluations have not been completed.
The numbers above only include evaluations which have been completed.
As of now, with our incubator and educational programing, we have impacted over 57 beginner sustainable farmers.
With our outreach efforts we have distributed educational material to over 5,000 people through the sale of our Spanish sustainable agriculture manual, published articles and social media efforts.
| This table includes our expected deliverables and will serve as a mechanism to monitor their progress and completion | |||
| Deliverable and Evaluation Method | Progress | Impact | |
| Main Project Activities | |||
| 1 | Offer 260hr Agroecological Incubator for 4 participants. Evaluation method: Keep timesheets as record and 1 report per participant of their project results and new produced documents such as: full crop plan and business plan. | Almost Complete | 5 participants |
| 2 | Distribute over 3000 copies of tested and revised spanish sustainable agriculture book. | In progress | 1500 copies |
| 3 | Host at least 4 gatherings with at least 5 local small producers, facilitate an open dialogue, and generate a list of specific limiting factors, identify concrete collaboration opportunities and potential projects to advance their operations. | Completed | 6 participants |
| 4 | Offer 140hr Apprenticeship for 15-20 participants. Keep attendance, pictures and evaluation sheets measuring new knowledge acquired. | Almost Complete | 42 participants |
| 5 | Offer 200hr Mentorship for 1-2 participants. Keep timesheets, pictures for record and report of sustainable practice learned through evaluation sheets and semi-structured interviews. | Almost Complete | 5 participants |
| 6 | Offer 7 month internship to 1 participant. Keep timesheet, pictures for record and report of sustainable practices learned through evaluation sheets. | Almost Complete | 1 participant |
| 7 | Record data of production, harvest and sales of ¼ acre market garden of Plenitud PR farm and present data in final infosheets/report. | In progress | 150 consumers |
| Curriculums, workshop material and User Instructions Development (Spanish) |
|||
| 8 | Further develop, test and improve full curriculums for agroecological apprenticeship, mentorship and internship experiences that can be replicated. | In progress | 4/10 completed |
| 9 | Improve systems and create design and user instructions for our physical and digital food hub. | In progress | several videos completed |
| 10 | Create tested efficient small-scale farm tools info sheet. | In progress | tools purchased |
| 11 | Create improved crop planning and farm management tools templates. | Almost complete | 5 tools completed |
| 12 | Create adequate harvesting practices and post-harvest processing infosheet and protocols. | In progress | Post harvest Protocol Complete |
| 13 | Create small scale business planning and farm accounting templates. | In progress | Personal Budget and Business Budget complete |
| Outreach, Marketing and Food Access and Literacy Materials | |||
| 14 | Record social media analytics and consumer information of in person outreach activities. We expect to reach over 4,000 people. | In progress | |
| 15 | Create 50 Spanish sustainable agriculture social media posts. | In progress | 16 created |
| 16 | Create 4 Spanish information packets of local foods, their nutrition facts, storage, recipes. | In progress | In progress |
| 17 | Create 4 blog posts highlighting local farmers and sustainable agriculture practices. | Complete | 5 blogs |
| 18 | Develop 1 Spanish mini-series of 1 minute video reels for instagram showing key sustainable and efficient agriculture practices. | In progress | 2 reels posted |
| 19 | Create 5 Spanish informational sheets highlighting local specialty crops, the importance of sustainable agriculture and statistics. | Complete | 5+ created |