Mateo used to farm using traditional methods which required him to burn virgin forest and purchase fertilizers and insecticides. It also left him very vulnerable to climate change and landslides and droughts. Thanks to your generous gifts Mateo has received training to make his own organic compost and insecticides. He is sure that thanks to your support his family will have more food. Mateo is just one of many families who have benefitted from your care for people in Nicaragua.
Mateo Altamirano is a farmer who lives in the community of Jamaica. With 11 children he has a lot of members of his family he needs to feed with what he can grow.
Mateo has always grown corn, beans and sorghum using traditional farming techniques of burning land to plant and then using chemicals to manage pests and chemical fertilizers.
Traditional farming techniques are harmful to the environment and are expensive as farmers like Mateo have to purchase the chemicals and fertilizers needed to grow their crops.
Mateo is in CEPAD’s Community Agriculture Promoter program and has received training on sustainable agriculture.
Now, rather than burning he uses crop residues to help fertilize his plants. He is also using other techniques to help protect his crops from landslides and crop loss.
“As a Community Agriculture Promoter I am very motivated with the workshops I have received...We are confident that with these techniques we will reduce the risk of being affected by bad rainy weather or threats of pests. We will have better harvests.”
Thanks to your support of CEPAD, families like Mateo’s are confident they will be able to grow more food to feed their families.
Mateo shared the following: “Today the presence of CEPAD in my community is very important, because, they educate us and give us support to better manage and use my land and plot”.
Thank you for making these incredible stories of transformation possible!