General Technical Documents

Planning for a Schoolyard or Community Garden - 2013-12-01

Brad Ward has many years of experience in agricultural finance as a loan officer and underwriter, and has reviewed and advised on hundreds of business and farm plans. Currently he works on the North Coast of Honduras as the farm manager for Cornerstone Farm/Hospital Loma de Luz. He also works with several school garden projects in his area. His background and experience mean that he has a good grasp of what questions are important to ask when considering a schoolyard or community garden.

When considering a schoolyard or community garden, I suggest that you use the following five steps to organize and guide the planning process. These steps can help you use words to paint a comprehensive picture of what currently exists, paint a picture of what is hoped for, and lay out an organized list of tasks to get from the first picture to the second. This garden plan is not meant to be something done at the beginning of the project and then filed away. It should be a living, working guide, reviewed and updated regularly to ensure that the vision and purpose of the garden are being realized. As much as possible, include all of the garden’s stakeholders in the planning and review process.

The 5 steps for planning are as follows;

1. Describe the current situation in detail.
2. Describe the purpose and vision.
3. Break the plan down into manageable tasks.
4. Integrate the project components.
5. Budget

F.A.I.T.H Gardening - 2010-05-20

Food Always in the Home as modifed by Larry Yarger, ECHO, 2010  under the auspices of the Asian Rural Life Development Foundation, International

Most rural areas of the world subsist on growing food, with food security top-of-mind for most agrarian communities. Believe it or not, there are still hunters and gatherers who glean food from local plants and forests, while also growing food for their own families.

My second favorite agriculture project helped provide food security.

Given the importance of growing food, the Mindanao Baptist Rural Life Center (MBRLC) created and promoted a home-yard gardening program known as “Food Always in the Home” or “FAITH” gardens. For four decades, the program has helped maximize home-gardening by promoting available local resources and introducing new vegetable varieties and growing techniques.

From the size of the garden to enabling year-round production to educating farmers about the nutritional quality of the food they plant, the FAITH garden program has provided a means of sustenance, improved health, and income for families. A well-managed 30×30 foot garden in the tropics can provide food and some extra income for a family of four to six people throughout the year! Moreover, it is fairly easy to do with the local resources available to most rural, farm families.   -- Baptist Global Response

Foundation for Farming (FfF) Practices Workshop - 2010-01-20

Technical Details on the Microgardening Production System - 2010-01-20

The Microgardening technology is mainly based on 1 or 0.5 m2 wood tables and therefore, can be installed everywhere. Land is an issue in peri-urban/urban and even in some rural areas. The technology can be installed everywhere in household compounds (even in terraces and balconies) to replace land. In addition, the reduced area of the tables (a few m2) is compensated by the high yield expected. Other materials can also be used (recuperated tyres, pipes, etc.). This is a crucial advantage in built-up areas where already limited space is under rising pressure as urban and periurban populations continue to grow. This can also sometimes be an issue in rural areas where farmers (particularly women) have not yet secured ownership rights over the land they cultivate, and so remain reluctant to invest in inputs and plant crops whilst there remains a risk of their land being taken away from them.

Microgardening involves far less physical labour than conventional gardening due to the process involved. As a result, people with different handicaps (disabled and old persons, PLHIVs) can be involved in it.

Saving Your Own Vegetable Seeds - 2010-01-20

A Guide for Farmers

AVRDC

Bio-Gas Manual - 2010-01-20

Utility of Canopy Management in Cashew Nut Production - 2009-02-20

Babli M and Nayak MG.,Biomolecue Reports, 2009

Cashew, an important horticultural crop, is gaining importance as an important rain fed tree crop both in traditional and nontraditional regions of the country. The demand for raw nuts for processing by Indian Cashew Processing Factories is ever increasing and now it is around 12-13 lakh tonnes per annum. Presently more than 50 % of the raw nut requirement of the country is met from imported sources especially from African countries. These cashew nut exporting countries have developed processing facilities and countries like Vietnam which are competing with India have improved their processing capabilities. Hence it is imminent to India to enhance the production so that the country will be self sufficient in raw cashew nut requirement

Evaluating Postharvest Practices to Improve Sweet Potato Storage and Culinary Characteristics - 2009-01-20

Curing sweet potatoes right after harvest improves culinary quality and reduces postharvest losses caused by diseases and skinning. This practice, however, is seldom applied by growers in Mississippi suggesting suboptimal conditions and quality for marketing in addition to losses to postharvest diseases. This project was stakeholder driven and supported by the Mississippi Sweet Potato Council to show the benefits of curing sweet potatoes and encourage Mississippi growers to adopt proper curing practices. The objectives and activities were to: 1) conduct on-farm demonstration trials on curing sweet potatoes in Mississippi; 2) evaluate the effect of curing on diseases and culinary characteristics of Mississippi sweet potatoes; 3) disseminate information about postharvest technology through workshops and publications.