It was a good day. Sun and cloud were playing hide and seek creating a komorebi (sunbeam)effect in the forest near Syaubaari, Jhumlawang, where my dad and I were looking for edible wild mushrooms. It had rained the night before, so the ground was damp and squishy, giving leeches a chance to...

This case study was developed by Self Employed Women's Association (SEWA) with support from the Asian Farmers’ Association for Sustainable Rural Development and the World Rural Forum. SEWA, a trade union was established in 1972 in the city of Ahmedabad, Gujarat. It was an offshoot of the Association's Women's Wing of...

Mix concentrated E.M. from the farm shop with molasses and water, and let it ferment for a week. You can also make your own solution of good micro-organisms with local materials. You can mix the activated solution with water to use on any crop, to soak your seed or to...

Strengthening agricultural advisory services to make agroecological knowledge and practices available to small and marginal farmers is critical to transition towards agroecology and organic farming. Digital learning tools are a cost-effective way to train farmers on agroecological practices, encourage farmer-led experimentation and local innovation, and upscale agroecology. Ecological farming is knowledge-intensive,...

Women-led cooperatives have played a role in improving women farmers’ technical know-how, leadership capacities, business skills, and advocacy skills. Women members of Yen Duong Cooperative in Vietnam were trained in agroforestry production, handicrafts making, and tourism and actively participated in advocacy and policy-making activities in their locality. They have successfully...

Via social media farmers market their organic produce and customers place orders from ½ to 5 kg of organic produce. Customers receive guaranteed healthy, fresh farm produce delivered to their door. By having a fixed client base, farmers have a regular income and get a higher price for their produce....

Agroecological approaches are highly location specific as they connect the links between the food needs, livelihoods, local culture, environment and the economics. Education on agroecology is therefore a holistic approach connecting these links, where farmers are in the centre of the entire process. With the realisation of the ill effects of...

The centrality of any education system is knowledge. This article highlights how farmer’s traditional knowledge on millets was explored, revived and documented; how ‘farmer centric research process’ was carried out through participatory varietal trials; and, how the community based knowledge centre for testing, access and spread of knowledge was created. Agro-ecology...

This monthly e-newsletter gives a bird’s eye view of all the exciting updates from Access Agriculture, a world-leading organisation for quality agricultural training videos in international and local languages, working across the Global South.

The European Union-funded United Nations Joint Programme for Support to Rural Entrepreneurship, Investment and Trade and in Papua New Guinea (EU-STREIT PNG) continues to expand its support to rural areas of the Greater Sepik Region, specifically targeting women and youth in capacity building of agri-food value chain. Here, the programme...

A two-day virtual regional consultation titled “Engaging with Academia and Research Institutions (ARIs) to Support Family Farmers and Food System Transformation During and Post COVID-19 Pandemic in Asia” was held by the Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA) and the Asian Farmers’ Association for...

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), under the EU-STREIT PNG Programme, has launched an Innovation Fund to stimulate investments in Cocoa, Vanilla and Fisheries businesses as well as to promote development of local companies and entrepreneurs in the Greater Sepik Region of Papua New Guinea. The Fund...

This article reflects on the regional dialogue on agroecology held on 12 May 2022 and co-organized by Global Alliance for the Future of Food (GAFF), Asia Farmers Association (AFA), and Andhra Pradesh Community-managed Natural Farming (APCNF) with technical assistance from the FAO. The event was a follow-up to the  GAFF, 2021 publication entitled The Politics of Knowledge: Understanding the Evidence...

After a particularly complicated and violent period in its history under the Khmer Rouge regime, Cambodia can boast of having halved its poverty rate between 2014 and 2022. Even if extreme poverty is still far from being eradicated today, this progress proves that it is not inevitable.

"This collection of essays provides a wealth of information and analysis about the Philippine economy and the role of agriculture and economic policy in it. The Philippine experience has been quite different from the highly successful Asian economies, with a long period of low growth until the turn of the...

The Regional Action Plan for strengthening family farming in South Asia has been elaborated through a participatory and multi-stakeholder approach in the framework of the UN Decade of Family Farming and in close collaboration with SAARC Agriculture Center, the Asia Farmer Association for Sustainable Rural Development and the International Cooperative...

Agroecology is not new. It is based on traditional ecological knowledge and can be found in family farmers’ practices, in grassroots social movements for sustainability and the public policies of various countries around the world. However, the education on agroecology has been largely in an informal manner. Given the challenges...

Many passionate farmers are giving back to the society by sharing their knowledge and experience on growing food in an eco-friendly manner. This is how knowledge got passed from generation to generation, traditionally. But, present day farmers are moving a step ahead by integrating the modern technology and social media,...

Traditional mountain landscapes governed by Indigenous Peoples and local communities (IPLCs) conserve unique wildlife and agrobiodiversity, and strongly support climate change adaptation and mitigation by protecting ecosystem services, including grasslands that store almost 50% more carbon than forests. But mountain biodiversity and the Indigenous and traditional peoples that sustain it are...

Dans les campagnes de l’Andhra Pradesh, cet Etat agricole du sud-est qui a lancé depuis 2018 le plus grand programme d’agroécologie au monde. Près d’un million de paysans y sont déjà passés au "natural farming", délaissant OGM, pesticides, fongicides, et engrais chimiques.