Entry by: Kate, Rebecca, and Janell

We are three Sustainable Agriculture Peace Corps Volunteers, working in the province of Bocas del Toro, Panamá. We have been working on a province-wide cocoa farm management project, within a larger cocoa project spanning Central America, training small producers on farm and production improvement techniques. The goal of the project is to train local promoters and farmers in new technical strategies and teaching techniques, in order to increase production, while protecting local ecosystems and biodiversity. The promoters participate in ongoing trainings to continually improve their skills and methods of teaching and motivating farmers. They then transfer the technical knowledge to farmers by facilitating farmer field schools. We live in our respective communities over a two-year period and work alongside local promoters. Although we are still in the beginning of implementing this new teaching methodology, we are already seeing its effectiveness in empowering farmers.

These new methods of teaching and facilitating appear to reach a wider demographic, motivating youth and women that would not normally participate actively. In general, in the communities in which we work, men maintain and make decisions regarding their family cocoa farms. Women and youth traditionally only participate in the harvesting and the post harvest processing of the cocoa. Through these farmer field schools, we are seeing women and youth, alongside men, take interest in maintenance of the farms, including participating in pruning, planting, grafting, and farm planning.

Indigenous Naso women and children preparing soil for planting of cocoa seeds

Within each farmer field school, we are using games to involve the participants and keep the sessions lively and memorable

The empowerment of small farmers encourages greater implementation of new technologies. From the planting of 1300 cocoa plants one week after the session on tree nurseries, to farmers’ visits to our homes to study grafting techniques in the evening, the changes that we are seeing in the motivation of the participants will affect the future of the families of our communities.