10 Mayan Farmers Learn About Organic Farming!

Christina Garcia

Ten farmers from Mayan communities in Toledo went on an organic farming tour in the Mountain Pine Ridge today. Many of the farmers are in the livestock business but also practice small scale farming. For the past ten years, these farmers have been working with Ya’xche Conservation Trust to find more sustainable means of farming, reducing traditional methods such as slash and burn, and use of chemical pesticides. To introduce new ideas and practices to the farmers, they visited the Blancaneux Lodge’s four-acre organic garden. Our news team just got back into the city, so we’ll have the full story in Monday’s newscast, but here’s a snippet from the day’s activities:

Christina Garcia, Executive Director, Ya’axche Conservation Trust

“Ya’axche has been promoting smart agricultural practices among ten communities in the Toledo district so what we have here are ten farmers from different communities that came to see firsthand experience in terms of the organic farming that Blancaneux Lodge is doing. Most of the farmers that we have here are cattle ranchers; they are into cattle farming and some of them are bee keepers but some of them also have small farms that they plant corn, beans. So, what we are promoting here is a different way of doing farming. Most of the farmers – the traditional practices that they utilize are more of the slash and burn but what we basically want to demonstrate here is a different way of farming. Blancaneux Lodge is a perfect example because they are doing organic gardening and producing a lot of vegetables just in their backyard. They are using a lot of compost products, regenerating soil and they have a lot of different techniques that the farmers can benefit from.”