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CONGO, Brazil, Dec 04 (IPS) – In the municipality of Congo, in the state of Paraiba, in the driest territory of Brazil’s semi-arid region, an original initiative seeks to prove it is possible to overcome several challenges concerning family farming. It is the EcoProductive Pilot Project.
This project shares innovations that support family farming production, combat the region’s desertification process and encourage young people to stay in the territory, learning to coexist with adverse conditions through agroecology, which includes biodigesters, photovoltaic energy and technical assistance.
The municipality of Congo has an area of 333 square kilometres, 4,692 inhabitants, 37.25% of whom live in rural areas, where there are 415 farms. Its Human Development Index (HDI) is low, 0.581, ranked 116th among the 223 municipalities in the state of Paraíba, according to official data.
Its average annual rainfall is 610 millimetres (mm) per square metre, which in the four dry months of the year drops to 5 mm, and its average annual temperature is 23.7°C.
EcoProductivo is a cooperation between the Paraíba state government, the Federal University of Campina Grande, about 140 kilometres from Congo, and the Community Association of Farmers, Beekeepers and Breeders of the Tatú, Tapera, Poso Cumprido and Barro Branco Communities, which goes by the unpronounceable acronym Acapcac-Ttpcbb.
The association was founded in 2022 and has 140 members (96 families), including 34 women and 15 young people.
A solutions lab
What is known as the Open Air Laboratory is located in the community of Tapera, part of the village of Congo. There, a small family farm was chosen where 30 strategic actions will be carried out and shared with the other members of the association.
The farms and the location of the Ecoproductive Pilot Project were chosen by a technical committee with the participation of association representatives, according to their moderate to high risk of desertification, their socio-economic profile and the presence of the Paraíba Sustainable Rural Development Project (Procase).
Sítio Tapera, the establishment that became the headquarters of the ‘laboratory’, belongs to José Roberto da Silva and his wife Marlene.
“I was a cowboy all my life and when I decided to stop, the rancher I worked for gave me a bonus. With that money I bought this land for 10,000 reais (US$1,750). That was in 2006, when the national minimum wage was 350 reais (US$61) and at that time the Paraíba river didn’t have water all year round,” Silva told IPS.
The 29.5 hectare site is crossed by the Paraíba River, which, despite being the largest river in the state, was not perennial until recently. Its flow was normalized through one of the São Francisco river diversion canals.
Water from the diversion
The São Francisco is the largest river entirely within the borders of Brazil and flows through several states. Work to divert between 1% and 3% of its flow began in 2007 amidst much criticism.
At a cost of US$2,450 million, the works have not been completed yet, but its two main canals, totalling 480 kilometres, in addition to making several rivers permanent, feed many dams in several states in northeastern Brazil.
The subsoil of the Northeast region contains important water tables, but they are brackish. The flow of the São Francisco represents 70% of all freshwater in the Northeast, where 28% of Brazil’s 212 million people live.
The Paraíba River, which has become a perennial river, allows farmers from the association to maintain dams in order to raise tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) fish. Two were built on the site used as the headquarters of the ‘laboratory’, which received 3,500 fingerlings donated by the state government.
The water drawn from the river is also used to irrigate the new fruit trees and the prickly pear (Mauritia flexuosa) of a species resistant to the pest known as Cochineal (Dactylopius coccus).
EcoProductivo was launched in April 2023. Among its goals are the genetic improvement of 400 cows, 1,800 goats and 1,800 sheep; the installation of a solar energy generation system and a biodigester to replace the use of liquefied gas; ponds for fish farming, and the production of seedlings of various species.
It also seeks to implement sustainable soil management practices, with the aim of conserving fertility and reducing erosion, and reforest degraded areas and plant fruits compatible with the conditions of the region, such as cashew, guava and passion fruit, irrigated with solar energy.
In the first year of project implementation, in addition to the fish ponds, a biodigester, a photovoltaic energy generation system, a corral that houses animals for the improvement of the community’s herds, and nurseries for fruit seedlings and reforestation were installed at Sitio Tapera.
The total cost of the project was budgeted at US$55,087, and Felipe Leal, a consultant for Procase, told IPS about its main components: the photovoltaic system, corrals, irrigation system, excavated tanks and the weather station installed by a state government agency at a cost of more than US$21,000.
Gas of their own
The biodigester, explained Professor Rossino Almeida of the Federal University of Capina Grande, who is providing technical assistance to the project, “costs US$ 1,400. Of this, 70% is financed by public resources and 30% by the landowner, divided in 10 instalments”.
“Bottled gas is expensive and I can’t fetch firewood because I had heart surgery. Now, with the biodigester, I only used the gas from the cylinder to make food for the whole family on Mother’s Day. The last cylinder we bought was last year,” said Marlene da Silva with a satisfied smile.
According to Leal, thanks to the project’s improvements and technical assistance, José Roberto da Silva’s family has already earned the equivalent of US$5,606 this year from the sale of cassava, lettuce, sweet potatoes, and is about to sell a tonne of fish grown in their two ponds. They have also sold three litres of honey.
The loan of breeding animals, the supply of seedlings and technical assistance is already benefiting the other families of the Association, even if they have not made investments like those made in Sítio Tapera.
Markets for increased production
On Ana Carla Ramos da Silva’s property, a second biodigester is being built. But with the genetic improvement of her goat herd, she already sells 150 litres of goat milk a week and is preparing to sell 190 kilograms of cheese, as well as expanding honey production.
One of the farmers’ main concerns was what to do to market a larger production. Procase technicians and Professor Almeida have been assisting in contacts with traders and in seeking access to public and private markets.
One of the priority channels is the Brazilian federal government’s Food Acquisition Programme (PAA), which buys products from family farming for distribution to welfare institutions.
“We finished the consultancy with a total of 15 EcoProdutivo beneficiaries enrolled in the PAA. We helped in the organisation of documentation and estimations of the products to be delivered, among other demands. It is worth noting that of 15 enrolled, 12 are women,” Leal said in a message sent to IPS.
On the day IPS learned about the experience, Sítio Tapera was also visited by a group of ninth-graders, mostly 15 years old, from the Inácio Caluete municipal school in Gurjão, a nearby municipality of about 4,500 inhabitants and even drier than Congo.
These teenagers, most of them farmers’ sons and daughters, have, in addition to their regular subjects, elective classes in the Rural Entrepreneurship Education and Sustainable Agricultural Practices Programme, which are not only theoretical. That day was dedicated to field work.
© Inter Press Service (2024) — All Rights ReservedOriginal source: Inter Press Service
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