Agrofloresta Mesoamericana

Teapa, Mexique

An Overview Of Our Solution

Agrofloresta aims at position sustainable agroforestry systems as the best options for farmers in mesoamerica. Deforestation rates in the region are big one of the reasons why is considered one of the hotspots where biodiversity is the most threathened on earth. Cultural importance of agroforestry systems is huge and this system of cultivation gave rise to the most prized mesoamerican products including maize and cacao. By providing a better price, technical assistance and acces to niche markets through a transparent value chain we want to mobilize farmers to turn their monoculture pastures into more rainforest resembling agroforestry systems that provide social, economical and environmental benefits.

Who is this solution impacting?

Community Type

Rural

Organization type

Other

Ecosystem (select all that apply)

Forests

Population impacted

4000

Size of agricultural area

600

Production quantity

50 MT

People employed

Describe your solution

Agrofloresta (agroflorestamesoamericana.com) tackles land degradation and its consequences by making smart agroforestry systems the best option for farmers in mesoamerica. Converting pastures into agroforestry systems will revert the land degradation trend in the region. Our approach is to improve local incentives and knowledge for producers in the area and inspire action. We have achieved this by: 1) Investing in centralized knowledge driven post-harvest processing which assures quality and adds value to products. 2) Creating smart market linkages to match product quality. By reaching niche markets which place value on the social and environmental impacts of their sourcing strategies, we have secured higher prices for products. 3) Increasing farmgate price to producers. We offer higher local prices for products (50% above local price paid to farmers for cacao). 4) Providing agronomic technical assistance and providing support to collaborating communities. 5) Serving by example by piloting our own agroforestry conversion efforts – we have project sites converting pasturelands to agroforestry systems with the use of smart planning and organic agriculture practices. We have already converted 40 has from pasture to agroforestry and use it as a demonstration site. 6) Using the systems approach. We add value to agroforestry systems in a holistic manner, developing niche value chains for the wide diversity of products within the system rather than just one crop.

Describe your implementation

We have worked with farmers to incentivize agroforestry production. We have done so both by creating more attractive sales opportunities for producers and by providing training opportunities which help farmers increase their land management and productivity. Attractive sales opportunity. Producers have access to an attractive package when they collaborate with us to sell their products. Firstly we increase local prices (50% increase in the case of cacao), secondly, we offer price stability, promising not the vary product price throughout the year. Next we offer convenience, by arranging regular sales points at the community we a) save farmers time needed to transport their products to town, b) we eliminate a volume entry point for participation – without the need to transport even the smallest of producers with just a few kilo of product are able to gain access to the market without the burden of transport costs, c) we incentivize regular visits for recollection and parcel maintenance which is crucial to disease management. Training for improvement. We provide various training and support opportunities to collaborating communities which help to improve productivity and incentivize the replanting of agroforestry systems for the future. We provide agronomic technical assistance on the management of cacao, we help groups of community producers register as formal associations which permits them access to government support services, we co-design locally appropriate solutions (for example launching participatory nurseries for replanting). Furthermore, we continue to build a network of support which can holistically add value to many crops in agroforestry systems, we link farmers with markets for products like criollo maize, annatto, jackfruit, etc. Our success shines most brightly through the enthusiasm of our farmers. They are involved in the process and have expressed their support for the way we operate.

External connections

While the development of the approach was a result of years of local research and local work in academia, since the launch various actors have become interested in collaborating on various aspects of implementation and scale up. With the local UNDP office and NGO Ciudad Verde we have launched an initiative to tackle the topic of risk reduction within the communities where we work. Conservation International has approached us to collaborate on scaling capacity at the community level to take on increasing responsibility for post-harvest practices. The Ministry of Economic Development of Tabasco has approached us to facilitate a program that professionalizes the cacao value chain in our often overlooked but full of opportunity region. We have collaborated with local agricultural universities. Providing opportunities for students to conduct their final projects with our initiative and have also hired several graduates of these universities. We are also working with Penn State flavor researchers on quality aspects.

What is the environmental or ecological challenge you are targeting with your solution?

Agrofloresta wants to stop land degradation in Mesoamerica. The region ranks as the 2nd richest biodiversity hotspot in the world. Land degradation comes from converting existing forests into pasture lands - around 80% of the existing forests have been cleared (CEPF, 2005). Just in the state of Tabasco, in Southern Mexico, around 1 million ha of pasture exist in what was previously rainforest. Rationale behind land conversion is complex. Extensive cattle farming on pastures is not labor intensive and requires relatively low investments, however, the economic, social and environmental aspects are not optimized. Land productivity under pasture is much lower than other production systems. Environmentally, pasture lands represent huge losses. Pastures on slopes result in erocion and pasturelands store less carbon, and cause large biodiversity habitat losses. Socially, pasturelands fail to generate rural labor opportunities and the rich nutritional output of more diverse systems.

Describe the context in which you are operating

Agrofloresta operates in an isolated and hilly zone on the border of Tabasco and Chiapas. The project works with over 200 farms in 11 communities, 3 of which are indigenous and speak three different local Mayan languages. Land ownership is a mix of private and communal lands. Some villages with communal land ownership can be guardians of more than 1000 hectares of hillside rainforest in addition to their cultivated areas. As our leading value chain, cacao represents one of the largest cash crops for producers in the area. The agroforestry systems where cacao is grown in an important reservoir of non-timber forest products for local communities providing many products rich diverse local diets. As the star of local agroforestry systems cacao has suffered from lack of incentives to ensure continuity. The goal of Agofloresta is improve financial incentive and optimize farm management which position agroforestry systems as a strong attractive land management strategy.

How did you impact natural resource use and greenhouse gas emissions?

Agroflorestry systems, particularly those which surround conservation areas like in our area serve as biodiversity corridors. Various studies on the subject matter show, that species from primary rainforests that require shade can also inhabit agroforests which they are unable to exist in sun exposed pastures. We work on the borders of three local conservation areas and we have seen for ourselves that as we converted pasturelands into agroforests, year by year more species from surrounding conservation areas have moved in to take advantage of this extension in their habitat. We have found monkeys moving in and have spotted more than 10 species of spontaneously growing orchids.

Language(s)

Spanish, Tsotsil, Chol, Zoque

Water

Agroforestry parcels in the communities where we work are often located in the hills where they protect local water sources. Agroforestry systems also help maintain moisture in soils, their shady microclimates maintain moist soils and humid atmospheres essential to tropical plant growth and cooling the climate.

Food Security/Nutrition

The rich nutritional diversity of agroforestry systems is a huge benefit to local communities. Various fruits, roots, and flowers serve a food for both local people and animals. Moreover, these products are recollected and a secondary value therefor they do not represent any financial burden.

Economic/Sustainable Development

We believe in sharing the economic gains of accesing a niche market along the chain. By doing so we incentivize the creation of more agroforestry systems that impact beneficially on people and on nature. As we broad our client base and offer our products to bigger consumers we will raise sales volumes and therefore increase the benefits along the chain. Transparency and traceability is a key aspect for achieving long term sustainability.

Climate

We have calculated the carbon sequestration coming from converting pasture to agroforestry systems around 300 tons per hectar. The organic matter content in the soil of our demonstration farm has gone from 2% to 6% in 4 years and that is HUGE. Consuming products from agroforestry systems definitely have a positive impact on lowering the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.

Sustainability

As a social enterprise our approach is highly sustainable. Revenue generated from the commercial activities help us continue to grow as an initiative and reinvest back into activities with social and environmental objectives. Originally the project was started with private funds and loans taken out by the co-founders, however our aim is to tackle large regional goals therefore we seek to increasingly pursue grant opportunities which help us scale our impact more quickly. The project has a revenue of 55,800 USD so far in its first year of operation.

Return on investment

We believe that our approach has a very attractive returns on investment (particularly when environmental and social aspects are considered). In the first year, out startup costs were $45,000 USD, including longer term infrastructure costs, and operating costs. Our revenue in the first year has been $55,800 USD. In the future, as we scale volumes and are no longer burdened by initial startup costs our profits will be greater, however will not permit us to scale as quickly as we would like. Additional grant funding would jump start our ability to reach greater geographical coverage and therefore have increased social and environmental impacts more quickly.

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How could we successfully replicate this solution elsewhere?

Our project can be replicated elsewhere and we think it would be a great opportunity to do so in other places with polyculture systems that surround a key high value crop. We have already talked to actors from other regions that work with agroforestry systems to scale up the model. As we build our strong client base oriented to high quality agroforestry products, we could build capacity in other organizations to increase their impact on quality and also raise awareness of the social and environmental aspects of agriculture. We have explored the opportunity with coffee from Chiapas, honey from Yucatan, vanilla from Veracruz and amaranth/chia from Oaxaca. Start up cost will vary greatly in terms of input price and volumes but we can create something similar to our cacao project for the same amount listed before (45,000 USD).

Overview