Inga alley cropping restores and maintains soil fertility, so that the farmer can grow his basic food crops and also cash crops, and achieve a better quality of life with independence.

Please support our work with any donation you can afford.  We are currently wanting to bring the Inga system to many more families in Cameroon, Ecuador and Honduras who want our help, as well as expanding our work with schools.  Introducing new ideas to the young can often be the best way to make changes.

You can donate using the donate button on our website www.rainforestsaver.org.

Here’s the story of one family who are benefitting from their Inga plot in Honduras.

Señora Rosario’s Productive Inga Agroforestry

By Warren Darrell

Señora Rosario is gathering pepper and lemons from her Inga agroforestry plot.  To get to her family’s land, you cross above the Cangrejal River on this hand-powered cable car, shown here being operated by her grandson.

La Senora is an energetic woman with an infectious enthusiasm. “¡Que Bonita!” – How beautiful!- as she examines the dark productive soil. She says that before she planted the Inga, the area had been over-grazed, the soil was hard and red, and supported only tough grass and weeds.

These Inga edulis trees were planted three years ago with seedlings provided by the Inga Foundation; they are now about four meters high. She has been pruning them, using the larger branches for kitchen firewood, and leaving the rest to enrich the soil. The site is now ready for planting corn, beans, and other crops between the Inga rows. 

Senora Rosario’s children and their spouses work the family plot with her. The Inga and associated crops are used for domestic consumption.  Now that the soil is enriched, she thinks they will harvest enough to sell some. Her family’s long-term investment is caoba (mahogany), to the left, and these laurel to the right. The caoba is much valued for furniture, paneling, boats, and musical instrument. The laurel is used for musical instruments and furniture.

The Rosario land is located in the mountainous area near the village of El Pital, Atlantida, Honduras. You can see the Cangrejal River flowing northward into the Caribbean Sea at the city of La Ceiba.

The semi-humid tropical biodiversity hotspot Pico Bonito National Park is just to the west of the Cangrejal River

Nombre de Dios National Park is just to east of the Cangrejal.

This slash and burn is taking place within 2 kilometers of Señora Rosario’s land. It is destructive of the forest and the soil.

Soil-depleting slash and burn shifting agriculture is a cycle of poverty and environmental destruction.

Soil-enriching agroforestry breaks that cycle, enabling a family to achieve nutritional security and a higher living standard by improving the productivity of their land without the need to slash and burn more land.

Please support our work with any donation you can afford to enable more families to take up the Inga agroforestry system.

You can donate using the donate button on our website www.rainforestsaver.org

Or you can post a cheque to

The Rainforest Saver Foundation

33 Pentland View

Edinburgh

EH10 6PY

THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT.