Last Sunday I had a chance to visit an organic Coffee Farm. Coffee played an important role in Costa Ricas past and is of great economic importance to Costa Rica today. Coffee was the crop that in the early years of statehood provided income as an important export article. And in stark contrast to the two other big export crops,banana and pine apple, coffee cultivation spread the wealth much more evenly across the farm population. That is because of the geography/topography coffee cultivation in Costa Rica has never been practiced on huge plantation but in relatively small fields (most under 5 acres) and on steep terrain. Until today most coffee is produced by small farmers who are organized in farmer cooperatives. The cooperatives realized quickly that under the Costa Rican conditions, quality instead of quantity would be the focus if they were going to compete with the big plantation on the high planes of Colombia and other countries.
Victor Luis Torres is 70 years old and part of the Santa Elena Coffee Farmer Cooperative. The coop currently sell about half of its coffee to tourists in the area and the other half to the US, mostly a roaster in Montana. Victors farm borders the famous Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve, protected land of incredibly high biodiversity. Interestingly, the land was purchased and protected by group of Quakers, escaping the Korean war draft, which ran against their pacifist philosophy. Victors farm is about 40 hectares (100 ac) located partially on steep hills and partially on gently rolling ground at an altitude of about 1200 meter. Three ha are under coffee cultivation, 1 ha bananas, 5 ha primary forest, 2 ha for farm buildings, garden and roads and the remainder in pasture. He milks 32 cows. The farm provides income for himself and his wife as well as his three sons with families.The 3 ha coffee are the farms main income. With 3 ha, he is actually one of the bigger grower of this coop.
The Monteverde Coffee from the Santa Elena coop is certified as Fair Trade coffee, and all members have to adhere to the strict guidelines. All members are subject to unannounced inspections and one members missteps would mean the loss of certification for all coop members. The coop does not have an organic certification and the members are allowed to use low toxicity pesticides and synthetic fertilizer. A few "organic like" principles are in the fair trade guideline. For example, a farmers is not allowed to depend solely on coffee as an income but must have multiple crops/products for sale. In any case, many of the coop growers are growing their coffee organically, without receiving a better price for doing do. Some simply do not have the money for synthetic inputs while others have a clear philosophical leaning and like Victor many years of experience in organic production.
Victors has a multistory agroforestry farm. A large garden with food crops, fruit trees, herbs and chickens provide much of the food (other than the staples of rice and beans) and medicines for the four families. Forests surround his fields and pastrues to provide habitat for beneficials, windbreaks protect the young coffee plants, fruit trees are interplanted in the coffee plantation, no pesticides are used,and the hulls from the coffee berries are composted with cow dung and red worms, dried and applied as the only fertilizer in the plantation.It was very inspiring to learn from Victor during the two hour tour and the obligatory coffee afterwards.
Pictures of the coffee cultivation practices, the plantation, and coffee plants in different growth stages will follow.
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Spanish Language and Tropical Agriculture in Costa Rica
The final part of my professional development year has started. During my stay in Costa Rica I am planning to accomplish three objectives: 1) studying Spanish, 2) learning about organic agriculture in the tropics, and 3) scoping out the posibility of developing a Costa Rica field trip course for my students.
I have been studying Spanish in the saftey of my home since Christmas. Now it was time to put it to the test in Costa Rica. I just finished attending two weeks of Spanish language school in Tamarindo, on the Northwest coast of Costa Rica. I was glad that the speech program had paid off. I was placed right away into an intermediate level. Of course talking to real people in Spanish was quiet different than talking to the computer screen.... I was very quiet the first two days..... But soon I became a little more confident and more comfortable in my role as a student. The teaching was intensive. We were four students in the first week and two in the group in the second week. The teachers switched after a week. Both my teachers were very good. Thank you Alba and Alejandra. Besides the Spanish they taught me much about Costa Rica, its people, politics, and geography. I had also chosen a home stay, meaning that I overnighted, had breakfast and dinner with a family some 10 mile inland. That of course gave me more Spanish practice and insight into the life of ordinary Ticos, as the like to refer to themselves. I wish I could have stayed longer.
Now I am off to see agriculture colleagues at several different universities across Costa Rica. In fact I already visited Dr. Hega Blanco, an entomologist at the University of Cost Rica and a (the?) driving force in organic Agriculture at UCR. Over the weekend,when the Spanish school was not in session I was also able to visit an organic coffee farm near the famous Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve. More on that in my next blog entry.
PS: By accident (or stupidity...) I shiped my camera cable to Oregon. I will therefore not be able to upload any of the Costa Rica picture before I return.
I have been studying Spanish in the saftey of my home since Christmas. Now it was time to put it to the test in Costa Rica. I just finished attending two weeks of Spanish language school in Tamarindo, on the Northwest coast of Costa Rica. I was glad that the speech program had paid off. I was placed right away into an intermediate level. Of course talking to real people in Spanish was quiet different than talking to the computer screen.... I was very quiet the first two days..... But soon I became a little more confident and more comfortable in my role as a student. The teaching was intensive. We were four students in the first week and two in the group in the second week. The teachers switched after a week. Both my teachers were very good. Thank you Alba and Alejandra. Besides the Spanish they taught me much about Costa Rica, its people, politics, and geography. I had also chosen a home stay, meaning that I overnighted, had breakfast and dinner with a family some 10 mile inland. That of course gave me more Spanish practice and insight into the life of ordinary Ticos, as the like to refer to themselves. I wish I could have stayed longer.
Now I am off to see agriculture colleagues at several different universities across Costa Rica. In fact I already visited Dr. Hega Blanco, an entomologist at the University of Cost Rica and a (the?) driving force in organic Agriculture at UCR. Over the weekend,when the Spanish school was not in session I was also able to visit an organic coffee farm near the famous Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve. More on that in my next blog entry.
PS: By accident (or stupidity...) I shiped my camera cable to Oregon. I will therefore not be able to upload any of the Costa Rica picture before I return.
Monday, December 13, 2010
Organic Agricultural College - Kalo, Denmark
From the Eco-School in Kleeve I went on to Denmark to visit the Kalø Organic Agricultural College. I had planned a full day visit to talk to faculty, students and staff and look at the school farm. Unfortunately, the overnight trip was a nightmare series of late trains and missed bus connections and I didn’t arrive until the afternoon.
The setting of the school on the bay of Kalø is stunning even in the winter and certainly in the summer. The Kalø College is one of nine agricultural schools in Denmark that provides a formal farmer education. All schools follow a standardized curriculum but those who come to Kalø receive a much greener version of it. The faculty is currently working on a separate organic curriculum. It is not clear yet if they will deliver that program within the existing standardized curriculum framework or if they will have a completely new approach. One of the problems in the existing framework is that after the basic course modules, students have to specialize and choose between animal and plant production. That approach does not work in organic agriculture because of the close integration of plant and animals on farms that are based on ecological principles. It will be interesting to see which course of action they will take when the organic curriculum is completed.
A few years ago the College received EU grant money to translate and deliver the curriculum in English. The goal was to develop an organic farmer training program for international students based on the Danish model. They got the program off the ground a few years ago, however, a truly international mix of students never materialized. Currently, 90% of the international students in the program are from Poland and only few other nationalities are participating each year. According to the instructors, the lopsided ratio in favor of the polish block appears to make it difficult for students from other cultural background to fit in. There is, on the other hand, still an international feel at the school because on campus is also a community college that draws students from around the world. Most of the 50 community college and 50 agricultural college students live on campus and are mixed in the college dorms.
The agricultural education leads to either a “Farm Assistant” or a “Certified Skilled Farmer” degree. There is a good demand for graduates of both degrees on Danish farms and both are very well paid € 2,500 and € 3,000+, respectively. Students of both degrees start with some learning modules at the school, continue with a paid internship of up to 12 month on a Danish farm, return to the college again for some learning modules before finishing the degree with another paid internship on a farm within the European Union (including Denmark). The length of the learning modules and internships vary so that it takes usually about 24 months to finish the Farm Assistant and 27 months for the Certified Skilled Farmer.
You can watch this YouTube video for more details.
There is no college tuition because, as in most European countries, vocational and higher education is free. When you live at the school there is a monthly fee of about $ 570 for lodging, food, books and field trips. To keep the room and board cost so low, students are asked to help with kitchen and dorm chores. Spouses and kids can also live in the college dorms. The internships are well paid and you end up making almost $ 50,000 during your education.
The learning modules at the college cover a diversity of topics and I didn’t think that there were major gaps in the curriculum. The basic module covers botany, basic livestock husbandry, soils, workshop and machine skills as well as courses in economics, communication, computers, job seeking, and first aid. The main course modules include specific training in crop production, animal science, technology and finance. I was not able to visit the college farm (because of my late arrival) or the fields (covered with a foot of snow). However, the photos of the farm look promising and seem to provide a great learning lab for the students. Most of the 125 ac farm lands are used for feed and pasture. There are also two and a half acres of organic vegetables, providing healthy, local food for the campus kitchen. The animals on the farm include dairy cows, some Icelandic horses as well as a few steer and sheep.
The Kalø program is unique but also has a number of elements that they have in common with programs I have visited in the past. With the program in Kleeve, Germany it shares the European traditions of a standardized curriculum and tuition free education. With some of the American programs it shares the community aspects of being on a farm and in school with a cohort of students for an extended period, participating together in both the social life and class room learning. It is unfortunate that the college has not been able to attract a diverse international group of students. This might be because they have not created a curriculum that is entirely devoted to organic farming. It is clear that the instructors are committed to organic ideas. However, potential applicants only have the college’s name (i.e. Organics Agricultural College) and a single course on the course list (i.e. “Sustainability in Farming”) to see the commitment to ecological farming principles. Larger issues (e.g. on-farm energy production, sustainability of food systems, etc.) seem not to be covered in the curriculum, at least not yet.
I want to thank Helge Buelow for organizing my stay as well as Morten Erbs and Claus-Ebbe Junker for spending time with me at the college.
PS: More impressions from Kalo in this slide show:
Ecological Agriculture School, Kleve
On a cold winter day a 5 o’clock morning train brought me from southwest Germany to Kleeve, a town which is far north and only 10 miles from the border to the Netherlands. I love riding the train so I didn’t mind the early ride. Kleeve is not a likely place for one of only two government funded Eco-Ag schools, but here was a farmer who had the idea and some dedicated faculty who made it work. The School of Ecological Agriculture in Kleeve offers a 2-year program for students who want to manage and organic farm. All students who are admitted to the program must already have a vocational degree in a green job (achieved with a three year apprenticeship) and a year of job experience after they received the degree. The goal of the degree is to give participants the education to become managers of an organic farm. There are about 30 students in the two years combined. The program first admitted students in 1996. Most of the students are 20-30 years old, about 50% from the state where the school is located and the other half from other states across Germany. Not many international students make their way to Kleeve, which maybe in part because of the language requirements and in part because of the perquisites of a finished vocational degree.
The school is funded by the state of Nordrhein-Westfalen, which in Germany means that there is no tuition. There are some fees, about $2000 over the course of the two years. Parallel to the Eco-Ag school, there is also a (larger) program for conventional farm managers. Many classes are shared between the two programs. Also on site are an agricultural research station, an extension office, a conventional farm and an organic farm. The Eco-Ag students benefit greatly from this diversity of institutions. For example, several instructors have both teaching and extension responsibilities. I used to have a split extension, research and teaching appointment and know how this keeps an instructor always up-to date on emerging issues in agriculture.
There is a good diversity of classes offered with an emphasis on entrepreneurship and business management but also many aspects of animal and plant production are covered thoroughly. This program covers also many important topics that are neglected in many others I’ve visited so far. For example, there are courses in value-added food processing and alternative nutrition. I feel that those are vital topics for adapting an organic farm to an ever-changing consumer and business environment. Other interesting courses cover on-farm energy (such as biogas, biodiesel, etc.) and building (with topics such as farm building design and energy conservation). Yet another set of courses deal with leadership skills because students who finish this degree are officially certified to take on their own apprentices and interns.
If it were a standard organic farming program one would find some gaps in the curriculum topics. For example, there is no further training in machinery maintenance or shop skills. However, many students have covered these topics during their apprenticeship and it is assumed that students are proficient in those skills. On the other hand, I noticed that students also come from non-farm green jobs (including bee keeper or landscaper) and they may or may not have had an opportunity to practice things like welding or maintaining diesel engines.
To have two working farms on site is a great plus for this eco-ag program. Any issues that come up on the farm can be immediately observed and discussed. There are, however, several limitations in the way the institution is organized. Farm and school are completely separated. That means farm decisions are based not on the education needs of the students but on farm management and economics (and also on the need of the research station). Also, the farms are both focused on animal agriculture not offering any opportunities in vegetable and flower production. As animal farms (dairy cows) they are great enterprises, showing a closed circle of production where all feed is produced on the farm and all manure is used to either fertilize the fields of produce biogas. I also found it unfortunate that students are not required to do any regular work on the farm (but some choose to do so). It is again assumed that students have had the farm work experience from their apprenticeship and job experience.
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Dottenfelder Hof - Biodynamic Agricultural School
"We do not want to condition someone’s thinking nor accumulate knowledge, but help to develop the excitement of all human powers, so they can recognize their own imprinted biases, acquire knowledge about the world to grow personally, and to let them develop their individual strength and personalities" (my translation of a quote by by Alexander von Humboldt, German Naturalist, 1769-1859).
This quote is the introduction to the year-long training in biodynamic agriculture at the Landbauschule Dottenfelder Hof. I visited this school to see how a biodynamic education compares to a more standard eco-ag program and I wanted to learn specifically how they organize the one-year course and various one-month modules.
The school is in Bad Vilbel, just north of Frankfurt. It is on a working farm with 350 acres of land on which pasture, fodder crops, grains, vegetables, and pulse crops (legumes) are grown. 80 dairy cows, breeding and meat hogs, and chicken are also core part of the farm. The farm has first been officially documented over 1000 years ago. It used to be owned by a monastery and later became property of the state. In 1950 a group of 5 farm families leased the farm and started a communally owned business. Since then a bakery, a dairy, a café and a health food store were added to the farm. The direct marketing of high value farm products is key to the economic well being of the farm and school.
In 1968 the agricultural school was founded and 12 years later they bought the farm building and some land around it (while the fields are still leased from the state of Hessen). The school offers courses in biodynamic farming since 1974. Today there one-month long winter courses and a one-year course. The January course gives students a broad introduction to biodynamic farming and includes (besides the technical information of farming) also exercises in anthropsophical art, observation (phenomenology), and eurythmy. There are no prerequisites to participate in this course. The February course is an advanced course for students who want to deepen their understanding of biodynamic farming. It builds on the January course and focuses either on plant production (course I) or animal production (course II). The February course is for those who are seriously considering becoming biodynamic farmers. It is highly recommended that participants have worked in a green job for at least two years. Rudolf Steiner’s texts related to agriculture are also covered during the February courses. The February course gives participants a good opportunity to see how the year long course works. The 4 week-long winter courses cost € 800, which includes meals and accommodation.
The year long course is the core educational event at the agricultural school. Twelve to 15 students live on the farm and are immersed in biodynamic farming lectures, seminars, projects, field experiments and daily farm chores. Most students are from Germany but there were also a number of international students (this year from Oregon, Italy, Romania and Japan.) All instructions are in German and a solid foundation in this language is essential to get the full benefit of the education. It is possible to live at the farm a few months before the course starts and go to language school. Students are instructed by managers, researchers, artist and others who work permanently on the farm as well as staff from other farms, research institutes, universities and schools. As in the Advanced February course it is highly recommend that students have at least a 2 year education in agriculture or related field before they start the one-year course. The cost of the course is € 8400 (€ 700 per month) which includes meals and accommodation (small dorm rooms).
In addition to the courses taught by the school, the farm also offers various internship and apprenticeship opportunities during which biodynamic farming is taught. Apprentices are either part of the regular 3-year government licensed general agriculture apprenticeship program (which is what I participated in before my academic studies) or they participate in a 4-year biodynamic apprenticeship. They may also be interns (of variable length of time) or conducting an ecological service year (instead of the mandatory army or civil service).
The diversity of learners and enterprises at the Dottenfelderhof makes farm and school management a real challenging task but it seem to be a real plus for the education. While apprentices and students usually focus on a particular aspect of farming (e.g. dairy management, vegetable crop production, etc.) there are chances to switch and look into other areas of farm production. Some of the students feel overwhelmed by the complexity of the tasks and opportunities. I talked to some who mentioned that not even the year-long course is sufficient time to get a good handle on biodynamic farm management. That in part is due to the fact that a portion of the time is spent on non-technical issues (e.g. art, astrology, philosophy, human health and nutrition, etc.). After visiting Emerson College and this farm school I am starting to believe that offering a little less technical information but including more opportunities to gain awareness of your social and physical environment as well as to learn about yourself might be a good trade-off in the education of the future producers of our food.
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Biodynamic Agricultural College, Forest Row, UK
My second visit in England was to Emerson College in Forest Row, about an hour south of London. Emerson College is a school that is based on the teachings of Rudolf Steiner, the founder of Anthroposophy. The Waldorf Schools and Biodynamic Farming follow this philosophy. It was a beautiful, mild (and dry !!!!) November day when I visited the campus. Unfortunately, Emerson College is not the lively center of anthropological teaching with 200 students from around the world that it used to be. The college got into financial trouble last year and had to close its door to the regular day-to-day operations and its future is not entirely clear. Only a few full-time and some part time programs now use the facilities and operate independently. Much to the organic/biodynamic agriculture community’s delight, the agricultural training program is one of those programs.
The Biodynamic Agricultural College (BDA college) has its own teaching facility, the Rachel Carson Center. Currently 32 domestic and international students are in either the agriculture or horticulture program. The training is 1.5 years. It starts in September and goes through March in the first year. Then students are placed on a farm (most biodynamic, some organic) for 5 months and then return in September of year 2 for another 23 week college training period until March after which the training is completed. The tuition for this training ($4500-7500 per year) is a little higher than the programs I visited in the United States but also offers different training subjects .
BDA college students mostly live in dorms on campus and are in involved in food preparation and custodial work. There training at the college occurs in six areas of work and study: agriculture, science, arts, economics, skills, and philosophy. They receive a foundation in soils science, plant and animal biology and regular agricultural practices mostly through courses that are taught in partnership with Plumton College/Brighton University. During their biodynamic training, they learn to experience the living formative forces in the agricultural system. They also receive specific training in homeopathy in animals. In addition, students receive training in the arts, movement (eurythmy), and observation of the natural world (plant and animal phenomenology). Students create a portfolio of evidence as a record of progress.
Organic Research Centre, Elm Farm, Hamstead Marshall, UK
On my first visits in Europe I went to England. My family went with me and we spent a long weekend in London and had a great time visiting the usual tourist attractions such as The Tower of London, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, Madam Tousseau, Buckingham Palace etc. On November 2nd I went to the Organic Research Centre (ORC) near Newbury (West-Central UK). The drive through the countryside was beautiful but driving on the left side on the narrow rural roads was an ... adventure. Green, animal-grazed pastures lined by miles and miles of hedgerows dominate the landscape in this part of the UK.
At ORC I visited with Nic Lampkin and his colleagues. Many years ago Nic wrote the only comprehensive text book in organic farming. ORC has five main areas of interest: research – training/demonstrations – consultancy/advice – schools/ colleges – community initiatives. As the center name implies, the focus is on research. Institutional and staff changes during the last 18 months further solidified this emphasis. I was somewhat disappointed that the grower training, school and community initiatives did not receive more attention. However, the ORC researchers I met gave me a good overview of the highlights in European organic farming research. In England in particular, there is a lot of research emphasis on integrated crops/animal enterprises since most organic farms here raise both field crops and livestock.
After my conversations with the Centre staff I had to clear my head a bit and went on the 2 mile farm education trail. They had some nice displays about the ecology of the farm and region as well as the day to day work on a livestock farm.
Many thanks to Nic Lampkin, Susanne Paddel and Thomas Doering for their time and insights.
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