Agriculture has been a fundamental instrument for the expansion and development of human technology and culture. However, many people, concerned about the environment, argue about whether the techniques we practice are healthy for our environment. Of course, there are alternatives that satisfy the environmentalist audience without sacrificing agricultural production, and a good example is the agroforestry system.
“It has been validated that the agroforestry system helps to conserve the environment, why? Because we basically imitate the forest,” said the owner of the Semila farm, Decenia Vega Rodríguez.
To emphasize, the Semila farm uses the symbiosis that develops in a forest ecosystem for agricultural benefit without the introduction of potentially toxic materials such as herbicide and fertilizers.
“We don't need to add fertilizer intensively, because part of the planning of the agroforestry system is to include crops that give nutritional value to that soil or that repels pests from other trees or other nearby and existing plants in the system,” he added.
As a result of this planning, Vega Rodriguez takes advantage of the traits of strategically chosen plants, such as their height, roots and reproductive capacity, to create a beneficial environment for his main cocoa plantation.
Although usually in Latin America this strategy is used with 15 different crops, the Semila farm seeks to validate at least 11 that grow in Puerto Rico and that in turn “have a high economic and nutritional value for (environmental) health”.
Teamwork
“At Semila, we believe in collaboration. To be bigger, we need each other. The neighbor and the local is not the competition, our competition is any product that comes from outside and is unfair,” he commented.
Puerto Rico is a country that is known for its high rate of food imports, something that worries farmers like Vega Rodriguez, not only because their income is affected by non-Puerto Ricans, but also because these other countries where the products come from do not have the measures and restrictions on products with toxic chemicals that have been implemented on the island.
“In Puerto Rico, our agriculture is healthy, because, although many partners use chemicals, in reality, they are quite restrictive. Compared to other Latin American countries, which are in supermarkets,” he mentioned.
For this reason, Vega Rodríguez considered the synergy of experiences and strategies, in order to popularize and expand the knowledge of the agroforestry system.
“Agroforestry is the happy medium between a system that contributes to conservation, but at the same time, rewards the work that the farmer does in maintaining the soils, giving him more income for his work. At the beginning, the agroforestry system requires a lot of energy and effort, but once it is established, it could practically run by itself,” he said.
To help other farmers implement this self-sufficient system, the Semila farm has partnered with the Science and Technology Trust to provide its expertise to aspiring farmers free of charge.
“This way, we make their initial investment lower and they can have a faster return on investment. The idea with this is to be able to contribute together the philosophy of planting in Puerto Rico, and show that it is possible to do here what is already validated around the world,” he concluded.
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