Sustainable Harvest International

Our global food system’s focus on industrial farming of commodity crops is leaving humanity with poor nutrition, poor water and air quality, poor soils, poor human relations and a climate poorly suited to our survival.  Situations made all the more apparent by the current pandemic.  SHI partners with smallholder farmers through a phased training program based in knowledge sharing and regenerative practices rather than external inputs.  Our multi-year agroecology extension program allows farmers to improve their families’ incomes, diets and environment with practices that cost less, produce more and diversified foods, stabilize the climate and make farmers more resilient to climate change and other disasters.  If all 500 million of the world’s smallholder farms used the practices taught by SHI on their farms, they would drawdown six billion tons of CO2 out of the atmosphere every year, enough to stabilize the climate, if paired with reductions in emissions.   

Hunger is on the rise again, with most of the one billion food insecure people and 70% of those in extreme poverty living in rural areas.  Ninety percent of smallholder farms and most large-scale farms, use agro-chemicals, burning, and other practices that degrade the land and water.  More forest is cleared each year to replace previously degraded land.  These are major factors in our current global food system’s contribution to approximately half of greenhouse gas emissions. In Belize, Honduras and Panama, the majority of farmers are smallholders living below the poverty line.  Most agricultural extension programs promote high-cost inputs to grow commodity crops rather than crops to feed their families, often leading to bankruptcy and hunger, while degrading soils and their long-term productivity.  Training in regenerative practices that reverse these negative trends are rarely available to smallholders who most benefit from them and are most ready to embrace them.  When training is available, it’s too short-term and narrowly focused to successfully address the inter-sectional issues of poverty, nutrition and degenerative farming practices.  

SHI partners with smallholder farming families who live with poverty, food insecurity and environmental degradation.  Our long-term, individualized agroecology extension model improves farm production, income, and family health.  The adopted farming practices also make significant contributions to keeping the planet livable for humanity. Our model is centered around knowledge exchange that leads to ongoing improvements in soil, farm and family health that is passed from generation to generation. The field trainers partner with farmers in every step; from creating their farm plan and addressing problems as they arise to preparing for graduation from the program and becoming community leaders.  Each family works closely with our field trainer to decide on the variety of crops and techniques they will add to their farm to meet their environmental, nutritional and income goals.  Our model has proven successful in four countries across different climatic regions and with different ethnic groups.  The results are long-lasting, as demonstrated by our 2018 report on 300 families who had graduated from our program in Honduras and Panama. The study found that 91% continue to use regenerative agro-ecology practices years after graduation, providing improved income and diet, as well as multiple environment benefits.

SHI partners with smallholder farming families who live with poverty, food insecurity and environmental degradation.  Our long-term, individualized agroecology extension model improves farm production, income, and family health.  The adopted farming practices also make significant contributions to keeping the planet livable for humanity. Our model is centered around knowledge exchange that leads to ongoing improvements in soil, farm and family health that is passed from generation to generation. The field trainers partner with farmers in every step; from creating their farm plan and addressing problems as they arise to preparing for graduation from the program and becoming community leaders.  Each family works closely with our field trainer to decide on the variety of crops and techniques they will add to their farm to meet their environmental, nutritional and income goals.  Our model has proven successful in four countries across different climatic regions and with different ethnic groups.  The results are long-lasting, as demonstrated by our 2018 report on 300 families who had graduated from our program in Honduras and Panama. The study found that 91% continue to use regenerative agro-ecology practices years after graduation, providing improved income and diet, as well as multiple environment benefits.  

Agricultural extension has traditionally focused on providing farmers with expensive, environmentally destructive agro-chemicals to grow a few commodity crops used to produce unhealthy foods.  SHI provides farmers with new knowledge to increase production of the diversity of crops necessary for a healthy diet for themselves, others, and local ecosystems. The techniques taught in our program also decrease greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere with SHI farms drawing down 16 tons of carbon from the atmosphere each year.  SHI has flipped the typical extension model on its head to create one based on sharing knowledge that has no long-term cost to maintain. 

The long-term nature of SHI’s approach enables smallholder farmers and field trainers to create individual regenerative farm plans based on local knowledge and expertise. The exchange of this knowledge when implementing the plans creates positive outcomes in biodiversity, food diversity, soil health and family health. Knowledge doesn't disappear like tools, and has been shown to be passed down from generation to generation. Unlike other organizations working at the cross-section of human and environmental health through introducing smallholder farmers to regenerative agriculture practices, SHI’s approach has been shown to be i) replicable in different cultural and ecological contexts as all staff are local experts, ii) proven to improve smallholder farmers’ family and land’s health and overall resilience, and iii) grassroots in its nature, with neighbors recruiting neighbors and generations passing techniques onto the next generation.

Agricultural extension has traditionally focused on providing farmers with expensive environmentally destructive agro-chemicals and limited new knowledge for increasing agricultural productivity. SHI has flipped that modeled on its head to create an extension program based on sharing of knowledge that has no long-term cost to maintain. Our model is based on a knowledge exchange, without provision of a “tool kit”. Through a long-term relationship between a local expert Field Trainer and a smallholder famer, knowledge on regenerative practices are learned, practiced and perfected. This new knowledge leads to a change in consciousness of farmers, which results in increases in agricultural productivity and biodiversity.

The regenerative agroecology practices promoted by SHI have been proven to have multiple environmental and social benefits in a number of studies, including a 2019 IFOAM look at trends and impacts of regenerative agriculture showing positive impacts on soil and health. A 2018 article by Claire LaCanne found that regenerative farms had higher profits than conventional farms, and lower pest infestations in the US.  Multiple international companies have partially adapted regenerative agriculture practices such as Danone, Mars and Nestle.  SHI's regenerative agroecology model is unique but has proven successful on 3,000 farms in four countries, in different climatic regions and with different ethnic groups. A 2016 Comparative Impact Study by Maggie Holland of UMBC showed that farmers graduating from our extension program grew a greater diversity of crops and were less reliant on slash and burn techniques than farmers in neighboring communities. Our survey of farmers who graduated from SHI’s program years’ before found that 91% were still using a variety of regenerative agroecology practices with better health and improved soils. The 2019 study by Cranfield and Agrifood supports SHI’s individualized approach using various regenerative techniques, as it leads to increased productivity over time, while improving soils health.  

To help SHI ensure we continuously use evidence to adapt our approach as needed, we measure impact against a set of indicators in 5 key areas: agroforestry, environment, food sovereignty, livelihoods and learning capacity for each cohort of farmers we work with. 

The challenge SHI overcomes is degenerative farming practices, such as slash-and-burn and the heavy use of agro-chemicals, increase poverty, hunger, rural flight, biodiversity loss, climate change and the contamination of water, air and soil around the globe. Land degradation and subsequent negative impacts on one's well-being, especially those of the nearly 500 million small holder farmers in the world, are inextricably linked. 

To overcome this, Sustainable Harvest International is committed to being a regenerative solution at this nexus of rural poverty and the environment. SHI's local and highly trained staff partner directly with families, using a proven model of innovative technologies, approaches, and knowledge to improve land and family health that will last for generations to come. Long term, identified outcomes span SHI's five areas of impact: Agroforestry - Sustainable farming and forestry preserve local cultures and the environment, Environment - Tropical forests are preserved to maintain life-sustaining functions. Food Sovereignty - Households and communities produce healthy foods in sufficient quantity to meet their needs. Livelihood - household income increase along with ability to meet basic household needs. Learning Capacity - Individual and community empowerment, innovation, and leadership 

SHI currently works directly with 382 smallholder farm families encompassing 1,920 people in three countries: Belize, Honduras and Panama and have another 3,000 families encompassing 15,000 people in our alumni network.  SHI’s scale-up plan includes a detailed approach to expand our reach to be working directly with 600 smallholder farm families and to impact an additional 50 farmers through replication partnerships for a total of 3,250 people in 650 families by the end of 2021. By the end of 2025, we intend to be working directly with 1500 smallholder farm families and an additional 50,000 families through replication partnerships for a total of 257,500 people in 51,500 families.  

In 2018, SHI’s board approved our scaling vision:  Through regenerative agriculture, Sustainable Harvest International will work directly with farmers, and with partners who will replicate our methodology, to halt and reverse the degradation of 8 million acres on a million farms and achieve food security for 5 million people by 2030. To reach this vision, SHI has a three-pronged approach: grow the number of farms in our program, test changes to parts of our methodology to lower net cost per outcome while achieving the same core impacts, and work with replicating partners to reach scale within current and new countries. Agriculture extension programs could have much greater impact using our extension model. For example, Mexico's national extension service had 25,000 employees before it disbanded. The service was provided, as of 2010, by 8,000 private contractors. Using the SHI model with 2,000 extensionists instead, a receptive country such as this could reach several of their SDG targets. The innovations to our model being contemplated as part of scaling up, such as farm mentors supplementing the work of professional extensionists, each extensionist could impact 100 farms per three-year cycle. Thus 2,000 extensionists would impact 200,000 farms every three years or 400,000 over two three-year cycles. Three countries doing this for two three-year cycles would reach 1.2 million farms that support 6 million people.  These farms would reverse land degradation on 10 million acres and draw down 20 million tons of CO2 out of the atmosphere annually. 

Internally, the number of field trainers is our primary barrier to increasing the number of farmers working directly with us, as our model necessitates the partnership between farmers and field trainers for multiple years.  To facilitate next steps for the other key elements of our scale-up plan, our most critical immediate need is the addition of two new positions on our staff.  A Director of Programs and Replication would lead the expansion and replication of our program and supervise the work of an Innovations Manager who would research, pilot and analyze innovation ideas for making our model more efficient to reach many more farmers. Another barrier is our lack of connections to many potential replicating partners. 

Externally, big agrochemical companies control government policies and public opinion to sway farmers and others towards the use of their products rather than regenerative agroecology techniques.  Farmers, businesses, funders, and policy makers are looking for quick boosts in harvests, something big agriculture companies say they can do with pesticides, chemical fertilizers and improved seeds.  Yet, over time farmers using these quick fixes find themselves in debt, with soil and other natural systems no longer able to grow crops, leading to further deforestation and land degradation.  SHI and our allies need to significantly raise awareness with policy makers and the general public about the harm done by agrochemicals and the many benefits of regenerative farming practices and the desire of farmers in the global south to adopt them.   

For the internal barriers SHI is making concerted efforts to grow revenue over the next 5 years through outreach to new foundations, strategic donor outreach, and investigating an earned-income component.  With increased funding, SHI will create and hire for the director and manager positions described in the previous answer as well as the new Field Trainers, for which there’s a large pool of good candidates, including some who are graduates or from communities where SHI has worked.  To connect with more potential replicating partners and funders, we will seek at least one intermediary organization that can facilitate those introductions. 

For external barriers, SHI is constantly working to adapt messaging and outreach with farmers.  Central to SHI’s grassroots approach is collaboration and sharing of knowledge.  SHI systematically encourages exchanges locally, and we have found that neighbors are inspired by the successes of our partner farmers.  One of our most successful recruitment approaches is through current and/or graduate farmers talking to their neighbors. In areas with strong reliance on big ag companies, this grassroots recruitment is the best way to demonstrate the positive impacts of regenerative agriculture.  To sway the broader narrative, SHI intends to continue seeking partners to document the outcomes of our approach and to share the results through a communications plan we will develop that will include publication of research results, a media strategy, conferences and working with appropriate networks to pool our evidence of the benefits of regenerative agroecology. 

SHI has a US based Board of Directors who support the 4.5 full-time US based staff: Executive Director, Director of Strategic Growth, Manager of Donor Engagement, Program Manager, and Operations Coordinator.  In addition, 2 long-term contractors support HQ operations.  

SHI’s country programs are run through country-registered subsidiaries managed and staffed by a total of 22 full time professionals from the countries.  Each subsidiary is supported by a country-level advisory board. 

Florence Reed, SHI’s Founder and Director of Strategic Growth, is a prize-winning thought leader and innovative practitioner who believes that people working together, can make our world better. To that end, she’s been building a wide-ranging network for decades as a delegate to gatherings such as the Opportunity Collaboration, Regeneration International General Assembly and Environmental Laureates Convention and through participation in other forums such as the National Peace Corps Association UNFCCC/Climate Change Conference, 4 per 1000 Initiative, UN Convention to Combat Desertification and the Global Partnership on Forest and Landscape Restoration. She may be the only person on the planet to have consistently worked at building out a regenerative agroecology extension program for 25 years.  

Elliott Powell, SHI’s Executive Director, brings experience as the Director of International Programs at SHI, as well as being a Peace Corps Volunteer in Nicaragua and a graduate of Tulane University with degrees in Environmental Management and Latin American studies.  Mr. Powell believes in the strength of partnerships between local and international organizations to solve complex problems and bring positive change to smallholder farmers’ lives.   

SHI local staff are carefully selected by SHI for their training and experience, and are native to the country, and often the region, where they work. Hiring and working hand-in-hand with local expertise supports the relationships between staff and participating farmers, while also supporting the need for the use of locally appropriate regenerative techniques.

SHI is supported by many world-renowned advisors, including Hans Herren, Andre Leu and Roland Bunch. 

SHI collaborates and partners with a variety of international, regional and local entities.  Currently, our field trainers work with volunteers from Global Brigades, Engineers Without Borders, Bridges to Prosperity and the United States Peace Corps to bring additional projects that complement our core program such as composting latrines, irrigation systems and bridges that allow access to markets.  The Peace Corps and local universities also partner with us to show their students and trainees examples of successful rural development and regenerative farming. Interns from EARTH University and other institutes of higher learning help each year with impact assessment and other projects connected to our work.   

SHI is part of national networks such as APAO (Panamanian Organic Agriculture Association) and have hosted national conferences for them.  We have contributed to a variety of activities organized by global networks too, such as Regeneration International. 

Over 23 years of partnering with smallholder farmers has solidified four key elements that make SHI’s approach successful: i) providing long-term technical assistance to ensure the farming practices and broader concepts we introduce take root; ii) selecting communities based on socio-economic and environmental conditions; iii) tailoring development and ecological solutions based in regenerative agriculture to best serve each family’s goals and circumstances; and iv) working to empower local individuals and promote cooperative sharing of knowledge and resources to build resilient communities. 

Through a phased approach focused on providing hands-on, practical techniques that build on farmers existing assets, SHI focuses on the following key areas of impact that are routinely monitored agroforestry, environment, food sovereignty, livelihoods, and learning capacity.   

Participants choose to work with us and want to become self-sufficient regenerative farmers, role models and mentors to their neighbors, and stewards of the environment. The SHI staff and participants form a bond and respect as they directly work together through the five phases of the program. It is through the bi-weekly visits that the change from land farmed with agrochemicals and/or slash-and-burn techniques turns to land farmed in a regenerative, ecological manner (i.e. with healthy soil and other ecosystems instead of burning and chemicals). After working with our field staff, families have an average of 5 acres of land farmed with agroforestry and other agroecology practices that regenerate local ecosystems, draw down carbon from the atmosphere and produce a diversity of increased crop production for a healthy diet and more income.  

SHI is at a critical juncture, having documented the positive impacts of our approach on 3,000 families and the planet’s health and knowing the precarious situation of our planet’s health.  Our staff, board and participants see the potential to scale this approach to draw down millions of tons of CO2 from the atmosphere, preserve existing forests and plant a billion trees on previously degraded land while  helping low-income, small-scale farmers to improve their diets, income and resilience to climate change, pandemics and other challenges.   

Becoming a Solver would not only provide funds and connections to funders in support of our next steps towards scaling up, but of equal importance, would give us the opportunity to connect with businesses, government agencies and institutes of higher learning who we will need as replicating partners to reach our goal of impacting a million farms by 2030.   Connections made through the Solve network would also be invaluable to us in expanding our base of advisors to help guide us through the new terrain we will need to navigate to reach our scale-up goal.  Last but not least, the prestige and visibility of the Solve community will help us, in conjunction with our allies in regenerative agriculture, to raise public awareness about the  potential that regenerative agriculture and the smallholder farmers who can most benefit from it have to restore ecosystems and bring greenhouse gasses back to pre-industrial levels. 

SHI would like to partner with potential replicating partners for our regenerative agroecology extension program such as agriculture or environment ministries, leaders of large international development and environmental organizations, businesses in the food sector, media outlets and academic teams who could analyze additional impacts of our program.  Also, we would specifically like to partner  with MIT’s D-Lab for R&D on one or more pilots of our innovation ideas to help our model scale faster and with MIT’s J-WAFS to research a supply chain mechanism for large numbers of small-scale, diverse farms in remote communities.