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New Organic Garden Project
Project Coordinator: Juan Bautista Cincunegui (Argentina)
Group Coordinator: Douglas Geraldo & Davi Profirio Alfonso (Brazil)
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Thanks to the support of Renato Pinto Campos and Bart Bijen, this year we managed to take our three-year-old Organic Garden successfully into a new direction.
Giving priority to the development of green plots of land and utilizing sustainable resources, our agricultural project aims to seek out new forms of understanding and enriching our environment; some of which arose from the group dynamics of our team of workers and others inspired by the different schools of agro-ecology (permaculture, natural agriculture, biodynamics, and organic farming). Our style of work focuses on green design and the need to interlace different elements of the ecological system.
Soon after the development of our first micro-garden (displayed in the photograph below), we followed with the creation of a second and are today working on a third. Our micro-gardens are vital in promoting the idea of the “edible garden”.
 
Our first crop of vegetables included yams, cucumbers, tomatoes, raddishes, chives, parsley, beets, broccoli, lettuce, various peppers, mustard, eggplant, lemon grass, carrots, chayote, and basil. Before, we had planted some varieties of local fruit trees such as mombin, cherry, lemon, lime, orange, six types of banana, raspberry, papaya, acerola, pineapple, passionfruit, cassava, and aloe vera.
This first step of the project evolved rapidly and generated new ideas, which became sub-projects. An example of such a sub-project is the construction of a hen house for the production of eggs, meat, and chicken manure. A second example is our large, man-made pond in which local fish species can be farmed; the pond is outfitted with a panoramic vista point located at the foot of the forest where springs keep the pond brimming with fresh water (our hope is to be able to finance another pond which will be used as a place for the fish to reproduce). Third, we have tanks full of earth, which our earthworms will turn into crucial humus.

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