Ever since I arrived here in San Pedro de Vilcabamba I have been working with this great development organization called the Colinas Verdes Foundation (http://www.colinasverdes.org/). The foundation was founded about 20 years ago by a couple from the US to preserve and develop southern Ecuador. 
Just before I arrived in my site, Colinas Verdes was awarded a large grant to work with the local coffee growers to both increase the amount of coffee grown in the area and to teach the coffee growers techniques to improve the quality of their coffee. One of the aspects of this project was to create a coffee nursery where we would raise coffee and many other types of plants in small plastic bags and then give them to the local farmers in order to be planted at their farms. So pretty much every day of my first summer here in Ecuador was spent working with the Colinas Verdes team at the nursery making the shade structure, seedbeds and bagging dirt to raise approximately 25,000 coffee plants. After we had given out these plants we immediately started the planting of another batch of coffee seedlings as well as planted some citrus and other types of trees to help provide shade for the coffee at the coffee grower´s farms.
As you can tell this nursery was a great tool for Colinas Verdes in order to complete their development projects but unfortunately there were some problems with it. For one it wasn´t very secure and we had some issues with thieves coming in and stealing plants as well as chickens or dogs damaging the seedbeds at night. Another problem was the shade structure we initially built was really only a temporary solution. After about 2 years the structure started to rot out and the Foundation wanted to replace it with a more permanent solution. Unfortunately the Colinas Verdes Foundation is a non-profit and because of that they didn´t really have much extra money to make improvements to the nursery after paying for office expenses and people´s salaries.
That’s where I was able to help with what is called a PL480 grant. The PL480 fund was set up 25 yrs ago by the US Dept of Agric as a fund to help with development of third world countries. Fortunately this grant money is made available to Ecuadorian Peace Corps Volunteers to fund small projects with a budget of no more than $7,000.
So, with the help of my counterpart of Colinas Verdes, we wrote a proposal to make the needed improvements to our coffee nursery. Our proposal contained three parts: 1. Put up a fence around the entire nursery to protect it from thieves and animals. 2. The installation of small greenhouse where the Colinas Verdes team could cultivate native species plants to be given out to the local farmers. And lastly, we used the rest of the PL480 grant to buy black plastic netting used in nurseries as a roof or cover to provide shade for the plants but that also allows rain to get to the plants. Also included in the budget were new tools, plant bags and organic material for future projects.
After some ups and downs with the buying of the materials, organizing people to help and many other hiccups that are typical here in Ecuador, I am happy to announce that this past Friday we completed all the aspects of our Coffee Nursery Project. Now the Colinas Verdes Foundation has a secure site where they can grow thousands of plants, teach farmers about organic compost and herbicides and basically use the nursery as a tool to help with the completion of all their future projects.
Just before I arrived in my site, Colinas Verdes was awarded a large grant to work with the local coffee growers to both increase the amount of coffee grown in the area and to teach the coffee growers techniques to improve the quality of their coffee. One of the aspects of this project was to create a coffee nursery where we would raise coffee and many other types of plants in small plastic bags and then give them to the local farmers in order to be planted at their farms. So pretty much every day of my first summer here in Ecuador was spent working with the Colinas Verdes team at the nursery making the shade structure, seedbeds and bagging dirt to raise approximately 25,000 coffee plants. After we had given out these plants we immediately started the planting of another batch of coffee seedlings as well as planted some citrus and other types of trees to help provide shade for the coffee at the coffee grower´s farms.
As you can tell this nursery was a great tool for Colinas Verdes in order to complete their development projects but unfortunately there were some problems with it. For one it wasn´t very secure and we had some issues with thieves coming in and stealing plants as well as chickens or dogs damaging the seedbeds at night. Another problem was the shade structure we initially built was really only a temporary solution. After about 2 years the structure started to rot out and the Foundation wanted to replace it with a more permanent solution. Unfortunately the Colinas Verdes Foundation is a non-profit and because of that they didn´t really have much extra money to make improvements to the nursery after paying for office expenses and people´s salaries.
That’s where I was able to help with what is called a PL480 grant. The PL480 fund was set up 25 yrs ago by the US Dept of Agric as a fund to help with development of third world countries. Fortunately this grant money is made available to Ecuadorian Peace Corps Volunteers to fund small projects with a budget of no more than $7,000.
So, with the help of my counterpart of Colinas Verdes, we wrote a proposal to make the needed improvements to our coffee nursery. Our proposal contained three parts: 1. Put up a fence around the entire nursery to protect it from thieves and animals. 2. The installation of small greenhouse where the Colinas Verdes team could cultivate native species plants to be given out to the local farmers. And lastly, we used the rest of the PL480 grant to buy black plastic netting used in nurseries as a roof or cover to provide shade for the plants but that also allows rain to get to the plants. Also included in the budget were new tools, plant bags and organic material for future projects.
After some ups and downs with the buying of the materials, organizing people to help and many other hiccups that are typical here in Ecuador, I am happy to announce that this past Friday we completed all the aspects of our Coffee Nursery Project. Now the Colinas Verdes Foundation has a secure site where they can grow thousands of plants, teach farmers about organic compost and herbicides and basically use the nursery as a tool to help with the completion of all their future projects.
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