Home Gardens for 200 Families, Oaxaca, Mexico

Dear GlobalGiving Supporters,

First of all, we are deeply grateful to you for your continued support of the project, as home gardens are very important for families in the communities of Oaxaca in these times of COVID-19 pandemic.

I’m pleased to report that people 50+ are now being vaccinated in Oaxaca. This clearly gives a ray of hope in the communities, as regular activities can start again--not quite as before, but more safely.

With your support from the last Little by Little campaign, we've acquired the materials to implement 10 new home gardens. The materials have been inspected by the local village committee and our field technician, Severiana, ensuring the quality of the materials and tools. We will distribute the materials over the next weeks and proceed with the workshops, training, and implementation of the home gardens in the Rancho Faisan community immediately after. Composting and organic fertilizers will be developed with our technical training, and the beneficiaries will manage the seed with the Municipal authorities, who saw positive results and demand from the community.

In the last cycle, production in the home gardens was very good, with tomato, cucumber, wild coriander, radishes, and pumpkin having the best yields. These crops were the ones that had the greatest impact on the families and which they asked to be used in their entirety for consumption. Doña Carmen, one of the beneficiaries, shared her story about the importance of the home garden and is promoting their implementation in her community, “It’s beautiful to see the harvest.”

I hope you enjoy the photos I’ve included. I look forward to sharing more news about the impact of these efforts in the following report. Until then, be safe and take care. 

Thank you for your support!

Marco Acevedo, Mexico Program Officer

Dear GlobalGiving Supporters,

Happy New Year! I hope you and your loved ones continue to stay safe and healthy. I don’t need to tell you that last year was challenging. In particular, COVID-19 took a big toll on our communities. 

But, we continue to work day in and day out in support of these communities. Since the last update we sent, we have been able to fully establish 10 home gardens in the community of San José Chiltepec. Our field-technician, Severiana Dominguez, coordinated a group of volunteers who worked on installing the mesh rolls to protect the home gardens and proceeded to plant the seeds directly on the prepared land. The families were excited because they were planting their own crops.

When we designed this batch of home gardens, one of the agreements was to save some of the plants to produce seeds for future distribution to other families. However, due to COVID-19 they asked us if we could reconsider the previous agreement because the next harvest will be very important for their families to alleviate the impact of the pandemic. We agreed to this change, but will continue to work toward local seed production and distribution.

I hope you enjoy the photos I’ve included. I look forward to sharing news of production and harvest from these efforts in the following report. Until then be safe and take care. 

Thank you for your support!

Marco Acevedo
Program Officer
EcoLogic Development Fund