Agro-biodiversity and environment: an opportunity to improve incomes and food security in poor rural sector

Cotacachi is one of Ecuador’s most ethnically and culturally diverse area. However, most of the population lives in poverty. This situation is mainly due to the unequal distribution of natural resources (especially land and water). Moreover, the exploitation of existing mines is causing serious damages to the local population and natural resources but mines are often the only alternative income for the population.

In the last years, Oxfam focused on fighting indigenous community poverty, through the reintroduction and promotion of neglected Andean grains, with focus on organic production, and the promotion of typical handicraft and pro-poor rural tourism activities. This strategy has been aimed at improving the diet and create an economic alternative. A producers organization has been created establishing stable links with national companies buying Andean grains and created a network of private clients.

At a national level, the rural policy implemented by the recently reformed Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock is focused on reaching food sovereignty. However, despite the positive institutional framework, there is still no coherent operational national plan for agro-zootechnical development. Furthermore, economic and human resources devoted at extension services are scarce and there are poor successful examples of good practice of bottom-up initiatives to feed the preparation of such plans.

This project aims at fulfilling these gaps, reinforcing Cotacachi’s experience in order to conceive a good practice that could be scaled up and/or replicated in other territories. The program is aimed at designing strategies to rescue typical local agricultural products and turn them in income-generating activities for farmers. This strategy will be able to influence Ecuador’s future rural policy and to attract state and international investments for extension and replication.

 

To reach this objective, the strategy is based on the following:

• Productive diversification: through the promotion of agro-ecological production, storage, processing and marketing of typical local products and rural tourism promotion through training courses and on-field practical activities.
• Assuring a quality production, through the application of production standards and the creation of a collective brand to ensure the quality of the final product and the respect of the production systems and environment, as well as through the strengthening of first and second level organizations able to offer technical assistance, training, credit and national and international marketing channels.
• Territorial Promotion by valorising local biodiversity and building a “territorial marketing” plan.
• Advocacy by supporting the development of strategies and local adequate policies, promotion of agricultural biodiversity, sustainable development of the territory with cultural identity and the generation of replicable successful practices.
• Gender equity and women empowerment with the use of the WEL (Women’s Economic Leadership) methodology in order to valorize and empower women, and at the same time to avoid the overburden of activities.
• Partnerships by facilitating and promoting a joint discussion forum between producers and other actors at the local level. This also includes strengthening the presence and the lobbying capacity of target community-based organizations towards a pro-poor policy.

 

Final Report Summary

Numerous results were reached by the end of the project, positively impacting the life quality of the targeted populations:

• New environmentally sustainable practices increased crop productivity by an average of 188%, especially for quinoa, amaranth and beans. Additionally, rural enterprises were able to store, process, promote and sell 80% of their products through associations, and 100% of the total production was sold.
• The project activities have generated higher income for 875 families, in particular from the sale to commercial enterprises of Andean grains (under 6 informal agreements) and of beans (under 2 formal agreements) in order to guarantee the quality of the products as well as a higher income for the families. These families also benefited from the diversification of their activities with tourism and handicraft for example.
• The project also fostered the promotion of agro-biodiversity through various events, including 14 forums, 3 cantonal assemblies, 2 culinary contests, 12 fairs and 4 tasting festivals. The tasting and culinary fairs have allowed Cotacachi to become a point of reference in the fields of genetic, cultural and culinary diversity.

Check out a video presenting this project :