TERBOL, Lebanon — Sitting cross-legged in the summer sun, Fatima collects seedpods from fava beans in Terbol, a quiet village surrounded by cypress trees and vineyards in the Beqaa Valley…
GORONTALO, Indonesia — In a Chanel-print dress and wielding a machete, Ermi Mauke means business as she hikes past cashew and coffee seedlings she planted on the approach to Indonesia’s…
The Landless Workers Movement in Brazil (or MST, its acronym in Portuguese) is one of the largest social movements in the world. Born in the early 1980s at the end…
OCOTLÁN DE MORELOS – “Look up to the El Peral mountains. That is where we do our ritual ceremony to call for rain,” says Josefina Santiago, 43, a Zapotec Indigenous…
Balintang, PHILIPPINES — “Seaweeds are important to me because they give me joy when we plant them,” says Melinda Gimotea, as she crouches down among the pile of seaweed seedlings…
DENPASAR, Indonesia — People in Sibetan village got used to wearing face masks before the coronavirus pandemic shut down Bali’s tourism industry for two years and killed more than 4,000…
Bangladesh is home to more than 130 different rice varieties, but a lack of economic incentives means farmers here grow only a handful of the higher-yielding types. This has given…
SORONG, Indonesia — Thriving across half a hectare in the hills of West Papua’s Mariat district are mustard greens, long beans, spinach, chilies and tomatoes. There’s also fruit such as…
MEDAN, Indonesia — Food plants intermingle on the second-floor rooftop of a house in Medan, the biggest city on the Indonesian island of Sumatra. They were planted by Sakiah Nasution,…
KATHMANDU — Growing up in the southwestern plains of Nepal, Prashant Ghimire was always fascinated to observe birds roam the fertile farmlands. “I especially liked to watch storks and cranes…
NUEVO MEXICO, Mexico — Standing in her cornfield in Chiapas state, surrounded by mountains and dry tropical forests, Maria Luisa Gordillo Mendoza looks concerned. “They said we were pigs for…
Tony Rinaudo is an Australian agronomist who was given the Right Livelihood Award in 2018 for demonstrating how drylands can be re-greened on a large scale at minimal cost, making…
When Brazilian farmer Hamilton Guterres Jardim realized the latest drought had wiped out two-thirds of his soy crop, he felt emotionally and financially shaken up, he told Mongabay. As a…
Since the downfall of Sri Lanka’s former president, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, in mid-July, some commentators have blamed the economic crisis and social unrest that precipitated his departure on his nominal experiment…
Nestled in a verdant valley in the southern Indian state of Karnataka, about a four-hour drive southwest of Bengaluru, the agroecology learning center Amrita Bhoomi is one of dozens of…
BENGKALIS, Indonesia — On the east coast of the island of Sumatra lies a grove of timber, fruit and native trees known as the Marsawa Peat Arboretum. This shady grove,…
Chocolate is one of the world’s greatest little pleasures. But its primary ingredients — cocoa, palm oil and soy — all contribute to global deforestation. The industry is working now to make chocolate more sustainable.
War, supply chain breakdowns, and climate change-driven weather disasters are pushing wheat prices up and increasing the threat of global hunger. Some analysts say financial speculation is making things worse.
Organic, shade-grown, bird-friendly: coffee comes with a lot of labels these days, certifications that tell the consumer their beans were farmed in a way that supports the people who grow…
KAVRE, Nepal – Srijana Karki still remembers her childhood when she visited her grandfather's farm. "The green fields were dotted with various fruit trees and we would get to eat…
On May 16, Natalha Theofilo rushed her 1-year-old son to the public hospital on the Trans-Amazonian Highway in the Brazilian state of Pará. Erasmo Alves Theofilo, her husband, waited outside…
Farming has been radically transformed over the past five decades thanks to technological advances. In Indonesia, the sector is welcoming yet another digital revolution. Jakarta-born Yohanes Sugihtonugroho set up CROWDE…
Fifty-two-year-old Dhonjoy Mondol grows rice on his plot in the district of Sunamganj in northeastern Bangladesh. This year, he harvested 12 metric tons of rice from the 4-hectare (10-acre) plot;…
SANTIAGO ATITLÁN, Mexico – Lucio Jimenez Ocampo is always surrounded by coffee. In the yard of his house in Santiago Atitlán nestled in the Oaxaca state’s Sierra Norte highlands, there…
ANGAHUAN, Mexico — "Cuchita is the fourth-generation herb collector of our family," says Juana Bravo, 45, pointing to a photo of her niece. "Look here: she was picking medicinal plants…
BLANTYRE, Malawi — A harvest of just four sacks of maize, each weighing 50 kilograms, or 110 pounds, means only four and a half months of food security for Ellena…
Plants build themselves from sunlight, water, and soil. And, as it turns out, what crops “eat” can influence the nutrients on our own plates. A recent study, published in the…
On an island in the estuary known as Lagoa dos Patos, in Brazil’s Rio Grande do Sul state, an old lady kept a treasure in her fridge. For years, it…
PALAWAN, Philippines — On a dreary April day, agroforestry worker Jimmy Tablason frowns in the sweltering heat as he trudges through the ruins of forests protected for decades by his…
Today we’re talking about agroecology, which applies ecological principles to agricultural systems and is considered to be a key strategy for both mitigating and adapting to global climate change, as…
