ARK Feed Back: a proven behavior-change catalyst that secures food and income in 16 weeks

Our food producers are hungry, poor, and trapped in a broken food system. 

About 80% of the world's poorest people live in rural areas and depend on agriculture for their livelihoods and food security. In the Philippines, 68% of the poor are in rural areas, with the agriculture sector as the poorest having the highest poverty incidence at 30%. With low and seasonal income, they are unable to afford a healthy diet for their family which costs 3.5x a farmers/fisherfolks' daily wage. In 2019, 57% of families engaged in agriculture suffered from hunger and food insecurity. 

Desperate to feed their families, many turn to what they feel is their only remaining option historically and culturally – monocropping, chemical farming, and deforestation for slash and burn farming, charcoal and fuelwood. These practices undermine environmental outcomes and in the long run exacerbate the impact of climate change and extreme weather events such as El Nino and La Nina. 

Chemical monocropping keeps farmers poor, vulnerable, and reliant on costly inputs. Farmers depend on one cash crop, where the buyer sets the price and the profit margins are low. They are trapped in a perpetual need to buy and use synthetic inputs to sustain or maximize yield. These inputs emit nitrogen that seeps into the soil and waters, chemically-saturating the soil, disrupting the ecosystem, and harming human health. The crops that farmers produce are non-food and/or for export, and they buy imported food at inflated prices and high carbon footprint being sourced from afar. The food system is broken, from production to  and it is degrading the environment.

In 2020, agrifood systems emitted 16 Gt CO2e, accounting for one-third of total GHG emissions. 44% was generated within the farm gate (crops, livestock, synthetic fertilizers, etc), 19% by deforestation, and 34% by supply chain and production processes (retail, transport, household consumption, and food waste). In the past decade, supply chain emission which captures retail, transport and household consumption grew the most at 45%. This increase is stark because mitigation strategies have focused more on within the farm gate and deforestation.

The negative contribution to climate from most small-scale farmers in the developing world comes from the use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, and the burning of forests to make income to feed their families. Both of which are tied to a vicious system that keeps farmers in a bind. 

In 2022, the Philippines ranked 158th among 180 countries on the Environmental Performance Index (EPI) indicating the need for policies and initiatives that protect the environment and conserve biodiversity and natural resources. It is also 17th in the world as the most affected from extreme weather events in the Global Climate Risk Index (CRI) 2021.

FEED BACK is an innovative and proven behavior-change catalyst enabling communities to secure food, health and income through creating a more equitable and climate-positive food system.

It is a community-wide vegetable exchange that inspires families to farm their food needs in their backyards, and to produce excess which they bring to the exchange and/or sell to neighbors and nearby villages. 

The Feed Back program begins with the 6-week garden creation and growing period, where the village transforms idle lands and backyards to food sources. Farmers return to their sustainable traditions, and relearn to save seeds, and make their own natural inputs again including compost and pest deterrent concoctions. They also relearn intercropping, companion planting and other techniques that bring back diversity, and increase soil health and productivity.

Then Feed Back exchange takes place in every neighborhood of a partner community once a week for 10 weeks. To join this collective and non-cash exchange, a participant commits at the start of the program to bring at least 3 kinds of vegetables from their backyards. In exchange, they get their fair share of 20+ kinds of vegetables contributed by their neighbors. 

This access to diverse vegetables is the initial draw. What keeps families coming back week after week for 10 weeks are: a. the fair valuation of the contribution – every family gets a raffle ticket for every $1 worth of vegetables they share; b. fun and games that village leaders arrange; and c. the community spirit that gets rebuilt with being together and sharing with each other. 

Locally, Feed Back is designed as a weekly celebration with the cultural elements of a fiesta, where families express local traditions and identities. The familiarity makes it easy for village leaders to organize and for families to quickly adopt into their weekly routine There is an immediate environmental, economic, and social benefit to every activity and this ensures that impact is lasting.

We work with farmers and fisherfolk who have an income of less than $100/month and can barely afford 1.5 meals a day. Rural farmers and fisherfolk are on the frontlines of climate action. They are most vulnerable to climate impact because their livelihood is reliant on climate and their homes are exposed to natural and chemical hazards.

When they are food and income secure, harnessing their innate skills in indigenous and natural  farming, they can be the biggest network of long-term environmental stewards in the Philippines and other agricultural countries. Feed Back is the pseudo-market that triggers families to grow food locally and sustainably. 

Ayesha Vera Yu, a former investment banker and granddaughter of farmers, took charge of her family's rice farm in the Philippines in 2009. She revamped their farming practices, moving away from sharecropping and chemical inputs. Her changes ensured stable incomes for farmers while cutting costs through adopting organic farming methods.

Drawing on her farming experience and understanding of food value, she co-founded ARK Lunch with another farmer in Capiz, Philippines. This program, rooted in school gardens, provides meals for children at just $1.50 each, easing financial burdens for parents and ensuring kids are well-fed for school.

In response to the 2020 pandemic, the organization adapted to launch ARK Feed Back. This program, based on lessons learned from ARK Lunch, focuses on remote methods, operates within set timeframes, and empowers communities to take over after initial support. 

ARK employs a rigorous partner selection process, ensuring community buy-in, financial commitment for on-site expenses, and dedicated manpower for weekly operations and impact tracking. Rather than directly implementing the program, the ARK team serves as strategic advisors once community engagement is secured.

Within the local community, ARK employs two managers and a data analyst to manage weekly exchanges, monitor and report vegetable metrics, and facilitate coordination. Simple raffle prizes are acquired to boost incentives and highlight the value of their contributed vegetables. Communities have the autonomy to organize various cultural activities like games, fashion shows, karaoke, and poetry readings to enhance engagement and keep families coming back weekly.

Additionally, ARK offers online consultations, hosts three in-person group learning sessions throughout the 16-week program, and nurtures a network of over 30 seasoned leaders committed to mentoring new participants. Communities are integral to every phase of the program, from partner selection to capacity building, implementation, and impact assessment. Ultimately, they pay it forward by sharing the solution with more communities across the Philippines.

In just three years, Feed Back has made a profound impact, reaching 77 communities across 8 provinces in the Philippines. During this time, The program has provided food security and generated additional income for 17,184 families, thereby positively impacting the lives of 135,324 individuals.  We aim to transform a total of 1 million lives in the next 3 years.

Integral to our success are support structures that we've meticulously developed and tested. These structures facilitate our ambitious scaling efforts, enabling us to expand our reach three to five times over in the coming year:

1. The "PlayBook": This comprehensive do-it-yourself guide empowers communities to implement Feed Back independently. With minimal intervention required from ARK, communities can achieve lifelong food security with a cost-effective one-time investment of just $1,500.

2. 16-week "Online University" Program: Our program offers community leaders dedicated assistance from an ARK officer, a Feed Back graduate, and a village leader. Through a blend of virtual and in-person events, participants gain invaluable insights and strategies inspired by successful leaders, facilitating effective program implementation and growth.

We're applying to MIT Solve because we're gearing up to bring our successful and proven program Playbook to Africa and other developing regions. To make this expansion a success, we're facing three key challenges.

Firstly, we need to establish partnerships in new territories to ensure a smooth transition and effective implementation of our program. MIT Solve's network can help us connect with local organizations, governments, and potential funders who share our vision for empowering rural communities through sustainable agriculture.

Secondly, as we prepare to scale up, we recognize the importance of refining our organizational structure. We want to ensure that our team is equipped to handle the complexities of expansion while remaining agile and responsive to the needs of the communities we serve.

Finally, with expansion comes a significant increase in data, and we need to be prepared to manage it effectively. We're eager to explore how AI can help us streamline our data collection, analysis, and reporting processes, allowing us to make informed decisions and maximize our impact on the ground.

In addition to our catalytic behavior change program, Feed Back, we've developed a groundbreaking tool for exponential scaling: the "PlayBook" – a comprehensive DIY guide empowering communities to implement Feed Back independently, with minimal intervention from ARK, at a cost-effective $1,500 one-time investment for lifelong food security. To further bolster support, we've launched a 16-week "Online University" program, offering leaders dedicated assistance from an ARK officer, a Feed Back graduate, and village leader, along with in-person events showcasing operational plans and strategies inspired by successful leaders.

These innovations underscore the scalability of grassroots initiatives. Over the past three years, we've facilitated the transformation of 77 communities across 8 provinces, enabling over 17,000 families to achieve food security and generate new income, positively impacting over 135,000 lives. With the introduction of this year's PlayBook and University, we're poised for exponential growth, projected to increase our reach sixfold within three years and achieve 25% of our ambitious goal by the end of 2024.

Looking ahead, our vision extends beyond national borders. We aspire to go global, forging partnerships with 500 communities and uplifting 150,000 families, ultimately transforming the lives of 1 million individuals within three years. Additionally, we plan to expand our business model to offer consultation services on our proven behavior change technology, empowering other organizations in this space to enhance the effectiveness, sustainability, and scalability of their programs.

Our food producers are hungry, poor, and trapped in a broken food system. Desperate to provide for their families, farmers resort to unsustainable farming practices of monocropping, chemical farming, and deforestation for slash and burn farming, charcoal and fuelwood. These practices lead to negative environmental impact such as emitting greenhouse gas (GhG), nitrogen oxides (NOx), sulphur dioxide (SO2) and ammonia (NH3); and seeping into and acidifying soil and water.

To inspire behavior change and enable farmers to adopt climate positive actions, ARK first solved the most severe pain points for farmers which is hunger and lack of income. Through a behavioral-change and ecological food-production platform, Feed Back gets rural communities to produce on a household-level, work together and lead themselves to building a new local food supply they can leverage. 

Within 16 weeks, families will transform their idle backyards into organic vegetable gardens that provide their food needs. Their excess production will supply their own village and region, creating a local food system and economy. This initiative enables each rural community to trap 205 tons of CO2e each year and to eliminate 2,425 tons of CO2e usage forever. Carbon is absorbed by the new biomass, vegetables they grow, and is eliminated as families no longer need to travel to town for food, and are not desperate for income leading to burning forests. With excess supply, Feed Back eliminates the need for importing food from afar.

Through Feed Back, farmers return to their sustainable traditions, and relearn to save seeds, and make their own natural inputs again including compost and pest deterrent concoctions. They also relearn intercropping, companion planting and other techniques that bring back diversity, and increase soil health and productivity.

In the immediate and short-term:

• Families will have more food on the table and address immediate hunger. 

• They will learn climate-positive and regenerative farming practices and ramp up their food production as a community local food supply chain.

In the medium-term:

• Families are connected to potential markets and earn new income. 

• Families practice climate-positive and regenerative farming reducing carbon footprint by turning idle lands to gardens and reducing trip to the market to buy food; reducing harmful synthetic nitrogen/pesticide by using home-made inputs; reducing waste by using recycled materials for container gardens. 

• Families also create stronger sense of community reinforcing behavior change. 

• Community leaders invest more and direct governance towards sustainable food security and nurture more climate-positive action

In the long-term:

• Rural farmers and fisherfolk are food secure, do not lapse into hunger or poverty again, continuously leading their communities out of poverty and inspiring others to create sustainable and equitable local food system

1. Creating sustainable local food system and supply chain

   1. Rural families are food secure and have access to diverse and nutritious food

      1. Indicators: Number and percentage of food secure families using the Food Insecurity Experience Scale

      2. Indicators: Number and percentage of families with access to diverse and nutritious food using the Food Consumption Score and Diet Diversity 

   2. Rural families have new income and economic opportunity 

      1. Indicators: Number and percentage of families with increased income; Average increase in savings and income compared to their reported monthly income

2. Fostering community leadership & unity

   
   

   1. Community leaders invest more and direct governance towards sustainable food system

      1. Indicators: Amount of co-investment spent by the community leader; Policies and other governance mechanisms issued by the community leader to support creation of  sustainable food system

   2. Rural families have increased sense of community and involvement in building their sustainable local food system

      1. Indicators: Number and percentage of families reporting increased sense of community and participation  in building their sustainable local food system

3. Nurturing climate-positive and regenerative farming practices

4. Families practice climate-positive and regenerative farming

   1. Indicators: Number and percentage of families practicing seed saving and sharing,  producing their own inputs such as organic fertilizer and pesticides; and using recycled materials for container gardens

   2. Indicators: Estimated reduction in carbon footprint by measuring the area of idle lands turned into gardens and the reduction in trip to the market to buy food; Estimated reduction in harmful synthetic nitrogen/pesticide by using home-made inputs

Feed Back is powered by a full suite of technologies that includes behavior change tools, modern technology, and traditional knowledge systems, combined to create impact that is lasting, sustainable, and scalable. 

1.  Behavior Change Tools

• 16-Week Behavioral Change Program: Feed Back implements a 16-week behavioral change program designed to shift attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors related to food production and consumption. Through interactive workshops, group activities, and experiential learning, participants learn new skills, adopt sustainable practices, and develop a sense of agency and empowerment.

• Non-Monetary Exchange System: The Feed Back exchange operates on a non-cash basis, emphasizing fair valuation of contributions through a raffle ticket-based system. This innovative approach fosters reciprocity, trust, and social cohesion within communities, encouraging continued participation and engagement.

2. Modern Technology

• Digital Content and Communication: We leverage digital content and remote communication technologies to disseminate information and provide guidance to communities. This includes educational materials, instructional videos, and virtual workshops delivered through video and voice conferencing, video and photo sharing, and calls and SMS. We also receive impact metrics and reports through cloud softwares like Google sheets and forms.

• Online University Program: We offer a 16-week "online university" program, providing leaders with dedicated assistance from experts, virtual mentorship, and access to resources through webinars and online courses. This program facilitates knowledge transfer and capacity building, empowering communities to implement Feed Back independently.

• Comprehensive DIY Guide (PlayBook): Our groundbreaking tool, the "PlayBook," serves as a comprehensive guide for communities to implement Feed Back autonomously. It is accessible online and provides step-by-step instructions, best practices, and customizable templates, reducing the need for direct intervention from our organization. This Playbook is also designed to be universally understood and visual, to ensure its applicability to multiple parts of the Philippines and the world

3. Traditional Knowledge Systems

• Sustainable Agricultural Practices: Feed Back incorporates traditional agricultural techniques such as organic compost-making, seed saving, intercropping, and companion planting. These practices have been passed down through generations and are environmentally friendly, enhancing soil health, biodiversity, and productivity.

• Community Leadership and Participation: We emphasize community leadership and participation as integral components of our program design. By engaging local leaders and empowering community members to take ownership of the initiative, we tap into traditional social structures of gatherings, games, festivals, fashion, music and dance, and foster a sense of collective responsibility and accountability.

Our team is composed of 24 full-time and 2 part-time staff.

Since 2019, Feed Back has been successfully implemented in 77 villages spanning across 8 provinces. Drawing upon the wealth of experience, proven program elements, and behavior change tools from our previous program, ARK Lunch, which operated from 2009 to 2019, Feed Back represents a culmination of refined strategies aimed at addressing food insecurity and poverty within rural communities.

The ARK team comprises individuals spanning various ages and geographical locations across the Philippines, with 83% of our team members being women and 100% Filipino. Our team within the Philippines is further enriched by representatives from diverse ethnic backgrounds and linguistic communities. Operating remotely, we transcend geographical constraints.

Within our US and Philippine Board Members, 57% are female, and 64% are Filipino. We firmly believe that embracing diversity of experiences and perspectives fosters the development of optimal solutions, a principle we uphold in our team composition and recruitment practices.

As a non-profit organization, our operational sustainability relies on fundraising efforts through corporate partnerships and grants. While our beneficiaries, predominantly farmers and fisherfolk in rural communities, do not directly pay for our services, they contribute towards the procurement of resources and materials necessary for program implementation in their villages. 

Over the past three years of dedicated work on Feed Back, we have successfully established a network encompassing over 17,000 farming families. Looking ahead, we are strategically focused on diversifying our income streams through entrepreneurial endeavors in the food distribution sector and expanding into social impact consulting to further support our mission.

Over the past three years, sustained donations and grants have facilitated our expansion from a three-person team to our current team of 26 individuals. While initially operating at a local level, we are now poised to pursue global expansion by 2025. The Feed Back program benefits from co-investments from each local government we collaborate with. This model not only reduces the financial burden on ARK and enables scalability, but also ensures financial independence and sustainability at the community level, empowering them to sustain the program autonomously following our exit after the 16-week period.

Our strategic vision encompasses diversifying our income streams through the establishment of two potential business services tailored for corporations and other social impact organizations.

The first initiative entails the development of a venture arm that capitalizes on the extensive network of skilled and motivated farmers who have successfully graduated from ARK Feed Back programs. This venture arm aims to harness the agricultural expertise and entrepreneurial spirit of these individuals to create sustainable business opportunities that align with our mission.

Complementing this endeavor is the establishment of a consulting business dedicated to disseminating our proprietary behavior change technology to a broader spectrum of organizations operating within the social impact space. By sharing our proven methodologies and best practices, we seek to empower other entities to enhance the effectiveness, sustainability, and scalability of their programs, thereby amplifying their positive impact on communities worldwide.