Getting Practical

I'm like a weed-whacking Samurai

Prepping seed trays with Tom and RADA agent

Week four of our Hub-based Training has gotten downright practical and we loved it. The week started at a nearby demonstration plot managed by the Rural Agriculture Development Agency (RADA) of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. RADA is essentially the agricultural extension service of Jamaica. This particular farm consists of about two acres and is used to demonstrate hillside farming techniques for more sustainable farming. First, our group helped plant some seed trays of tomato and cabbage. Afterward we cleared weeds out of about three beds and turned the soil. The last phase was measuring out the beds and planting some Scotch Bonnet pepper sprouts at the appropriate intervals, giving each plant just a sprinkle of 20-20-20. I hope one of these demonstration plots will be nearby the site Linnae and I will end up living as they can serve as a great venue for introducing technology. 

Chris teaching us to identify contours at ZionItes

On Tuesday we switched gears a bit and took a bus up to St. Ann parish to visit ZionItes organic farm. Managed by a Rastafarian Jamaican (Chris) and his American wife (Lisa), the farm sits on 15 acres of a predominantly hillside landscape. At the time we were there I would estimate about five acres to be in production. Chris taught us about the principles of organic farming, how to use an A-frame to determine contour, and how to construct a compost heap out of locally available material. Lisa is the marketing force behind the farm. She talked to us about how she has established linkages to the high-end villas, restaurant, and hotel chefs, which has allowed them to achieve pretty high rates of return. She also does her own agro-processing in terms of making bread, salad dressing, and a killer hot sauce. While we were on the farm we picked our own salad greens to eat with our lunch of soup, fresh banana bread, homemade wheat bread, and stir fried vegetables. The contrast of Chris and Lisa made them a lot of fun to learn from. Chris is a mild-mannered, barefoot farmer living in the bush with his former NYC school principal wife with noticeable remnants of Brooklyn style. Regardless, they churn out some pretty tasty produce and seem to be having fun doing it.   

Setting up the lower barrier

There are two Aggies in this photo!

Wednesday we were visited by extension agents from RADA for some hands-on training. There is a small demo plot right next to our training center. So, with machetes in hand we chopped down and chopped up bamboo, cleared most of the grass off a hillside, and put in place a solid barrier on the bottom and planted pineapple to serve as a barrier on the top of the slope. This coming week we will further develop the plot and plant some more crops. After three days of hands-on experience, I realize how convenient it is to live and farm on flat land back home. If I lived down here, I’d probably try to make it in livestock.                                                                   

Thursday we visited one of the three certified organic farms in Jamaica, which just happens to be here in Woodford. The tour was led by the woman who runs the farm as well as the lady who is president of the Jamaica Organic Agriculture Movement (JOAM). JOAM is an NGO which serves as the certifying body on the island, whereas the USDA certifies farms in the U.S. This was another worthwhile tour, but it has become apparent that there are some obstacles to adoption of organic farming in Jamaica.  Converting to organic is a knowledge intensive process that requires more literacy and numeracy than many Jamaican farmers have. It also takes three years to convert and during which yields initially decline, so farmers would need to have sizeable savings as a buffer. There is also a ceiling for demand because the country has a fairly small middle class. There are a lot of ecologically fragile areas of the island where organic is probably the only responsible farming method, it is just going to be a struggle to get it to take root (pun intended).

Hillside beds at organic farm in Woodford

Friday we stayed inside, mainly because the rain fell most of the day. In the morning some other volunteers and I gave brief lessons on skills from our background that might be useful in the Ag/Env sector. I did mine on Participatory Learning & Action (Google it) because it complements the strategies that Peace Corps recommends for working with  a community to analyze issues and act on needs. PLA is also going to be a component of my Master’s thesis. That afternoon, a group of local farmers came for an open forum on agricultural issues. They graciously fielded rapid-fire questions from us on a range of topics. I was interested to find out that marketing was chief among their concern. I guess I expected more conversation about production issues. Some of the market problems were regular gluts, low farmgate prices, and international competition. I really look forward to having similar discussions with farmers when I get to site, I just hope they will be open and motivated to work on things at a grassroots level.

Doctor Bird (male)

On Saturday, Linnae and I went to church and attended a nine-night. We arrived at the Seventh Day Adventist church at about 9:30 am. For about the first hour there was singing and bible study. This was followed by two baptisms and communion ceremonies. The SDA communion was an interesting experience as they practice the washing of feet as Jesus washed the feet of his disciples at the Lord’s Supper. The congregation was split by males and females for the humbling practice of washing one another’s feet. One definitely feels part of the community after that exercise. The remainder of communion was pretty normal and consisted of the bread and wine. At about 3:00pm the church took a recess for lunch; Linnae and I were able to come home at that point. She and I took a nap and were pretty lazy in preparation for the nine-night (wake). The nine-night is more or less an all-night party that is held about nine nights after a person dies and a day or two before the funeral. We got there at about 10:30 and left a little after 1:00, but the party was going strong.

Monday morning marks the beginning of the end of our training. We leave Woodford on Sunday for a brief stay in Kingston where we will find out the location of our service and our counterparts for the next 24 months. We will be getting down to the business of promoting improved agricultural practices and community development in no time.

Peace Corps Masters International

I’ve started to get a little more time to get back to reviewing literature. I recently finished a book on Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) and am now working on a book about mixed-method research in development. My parents are soon sending my writer’s guide, statistics book, and some other texts (how’s that for a care package?). People keep asking me what my thesis is going to be focused on, but my answer remains that it really depends on my community and the work that I will be doing there. I do feel confident that it will be nested in PRA, diffusion of innovations theory, and have a mixed-method design (qualitative and quantitative). It is a good thing this will be social science research because it gives me the flexibility to design and collect data based on local conditions. It must be incredibly difficult for a natural sciences student to do PCMI.