Sustainable Agriculture Morocco Project #8776

Plant Organic Fruit Trees with African Farmers

by High Atlas Foundation

Plant Organic Fruit Trees with African Farmers

Project Report | Jun 8, 2017
Evaluating Community Fruit Tree Nurseries

By Dr. Yossef Ben-Meir | President of the High Atlas Foundation

Some say that capacity building is the best investment. There are certainly cases that support this idea. This is an example where a technical assessment of four tree nurseries shows the importance of focused training.

Foremost, evaluation would focus on identifying problems and rectifying them. The common problems are the best place to start. This highlights an unspoken aspect of training and capacity building. This is that the simplest solutions should not be overlooked.

One issue is uneven tree growth brought about by uneven watering. There is a simple solution. For all nurseries, drip lines should be periodically cleaned. The other option would be to install water filters. The latter is expensive and, given the relatively small size of each nursery, cleaning the lines would the cheapest option.

There is yet another aspect to nursery management, one that rises high in importance. This the relative cost of an action or option. At the least, this is worth mentioning within a training session. Better yet, this should be a key part of the training.

This leads to the notion of objectives, both of the training and of the organization. Non-profit groups do not profit from their work. Instead, they provide those in need with a service or product. The product is fruit trees. The means of production are the nurseries and, as with the profit sector, costs are not to be overlooked.

The goal of HAF is to offer trees to local farmers. In doing so, these are strived to be of good quality and capable to surviving the riggers of on-farm life. For HAF, this means the best product at the lowest cost. This translates into the cost, per survivable, on-farm tree.

Capacity building will stress the means via the goal. Turning back to the nursery problems, the situation complicates as local problems are addressed. Where water is plentiful and free, space is often limited. Again, the issue was viability when the possibilities for expansion are severely limited.

Concentrating production would lead to economies of scale and a hoped for lowering of costs. On the capacity front, this requires training fewer people and, with concentrated production, the possibilities for more uniform nursery.

The goal is, first through evaluation, later training, to evolve into a standardized system for raising trees. This could be a system where the trees are raised in the ground, dug up, and given to farmers. The other option is to grow the seedlings in soil-filled bags. The in-ground method is inherently cheaper but, unless transplanted quickly, survivability in reduced. The bags can be a bit more costly but more reliable in regard to survivability.

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Apr 17, 2017
Distributing YOUR Trees to Moroccan villages.

By Kerstin Opfer | HAF Volunteer

ver the last two days I helped Mohamed, a volunteer of the High Atlas Foundation, with the distribution of a thousand trees, 300 almond and 700 walnut trees, in the commune Zerkten in the High Atlas Mountains. After we picked up the trees from the nursery in Ourika, we took the transport from Ait Ourir and travelled to one of the most remote areas I have ever visited. The further we got the more difficult and onerous the road got to a point where the driver had to check the engine and tires every half an hour. On our way we met several farmers, provided them with trees and visited the land, where they intend to plant the trees. Seeing their thankfulness and appreciation gave me great trust that they will take good care of the trees so that they will grow up to be strong and healthy. Once mature, after approximately four years for almond and six years for walnut, every walnut tree will increase the farmer’s yearly income by 300 dollars and every almond tree by 15 dollars. Almond trees can live longer than a century, and walnut more than four centuries. This new revenue from the nuts will be a great help for these farmers to overcome subsistence agriculture and poverty and will promote the sustainable development of their local communities.

After a long and exhausting journey we were welcomed warmly by Mohamed’s brother and his wife in a small village called Isoual located directly under the white snowy peaks of the High Atlas Mountains. They live in a beautiful stone house that was built one century ago. Hand-woven colourful carpets cover the floor of the kitchen and the thick walls are painted in green and rose. They prepared a tasty tajine for dinner, served us hot tea and fruit and even gave me their bedroom for sleeping. On the next morning we ate the most delicious Hsowa, bread and coffee, before we went to visit the fields and families of the small village. Our arrival was a big event and everywhere we went we were welcomed most kindly. I was amazed by their pure and selfless hospitality. They live with little and still share every last bit of their belongings with incredible generosity. After a second breakfast with Msemen and tea we had to start our trip back to Marrakech. Because there was no transport from the village, we hiked until we got to the street that connects Marrakech and Ouarzazate, from where we caught a grand taxi back to Marrakech.

Overall, this trip so far was one of the most valuable experiences for me in Morocco. Witnessing such poverty, generosity and peacefulness in mind, keeps me thinking, how many things I just take for granted and don’t appreciate as I should. I will do my very best to give back to this rural Moroccan communities by encouraging their sustainable development. Establishing the complete agricultural value chain by promoting organic fruit and nut tree plantation is an important step in this process and will lead to an increased income, thereby enabling the implementation of developmental projects like improved education and women empowerment. I am incredibly thankful for their hospitality and for the lesson they taught me. It was an amazing and priceless experience that I will not forget for a long time.

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Apr 5, 2017
Morocco needs thousands of community- managed tree nurseries.

By Yossef Ben-Meir | President of the High Atlas Foundation

Given that most poverty in the nation (and in the world) exists in rural places, and that Moroccan farmers are transitioning from traditionally growing barley and corn, the demand for more profitable fruit trees is very significant. Growing fruit trees from seedlings on land lent by the Moroccan Jewish Community and distributing them in-kind to farming families not only meets a national development priority, but is also a substantial act of interfaith. The reinvigorated relationships between the farming families and Jewish community members leads to deepened appreciation among the beneficiaries of these historic religious places (even as the burial sites have been totally respected ever since their beginning). This multicultural initiative lends towards more goodwill due to the sustainable human development results, and in turn increased social unity and actions of cultural preservation.

What maximizes the measure of solidarity (and project sustainability), however, is that the farming communities themselves identified fruit trees and their varieties as a development priority. Therefore, the project responds to the expressed needs of the people, their associations and cooperatives and helps to deliver the development outcomes they seek, illustrating how cultural benefits can be maximized when participatory dialogue and planning is fully incorporated into their processes.

Several thousand tree and medicinal plant nurseries need to be created for the kingdom to generate the billion plants once estimated by the Ministry of Agriculture that are required to break the poverty cycle. Farming families face a barrier to transition to more lucrative cash crops and grow nurseries, because of the two years necessary to grow seeds into young trees. Therefore, lending land for nurseries is essential to overcome these concerns as farmers will not risk reducing the amount of their arable land available to them during the two-year period. Contributing land for community nurseries can be extremely helpful therefore in overcoming rural poverty.

The farming families and their local organizations are the sole beneficiaries of the income generated by the sale of the fruit, which will be certified organic with the assistance of HAF. Their carbon offsets will be monitored and also sold, generating further income for cooperatives and families. Certification (which is granted and audited by ECOCERT - and recognized in both the United States and the European Union). Certification involves field analysis, village level contracts committing farmers to organic practices, water and soil testing, and experiential training in the organic caretaking and harvesting procedures. The farmers and schools directly benefiting from this initiative are among the most marginalized (determined through participatory community assessments).

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