“At Sustainable Harvest International, soil analysis guides our approach to sustainable agriculture with smallholders. LandPKS allows us to better understand the constraints and potential of each plot, supporting agricultural interventions that improve productivity, conserve soil, and strengthen family livelihoods.”
In the first week of February, Sustainable Harvest International (SHI) trained 25 leading farmers on LandPKS Soil ID as a part of their program to promote regenerative agriculture in Honduras.
Sustainable Harvest International spreads knowledge of sustainable agricultural practices through Farmer Field Schools. This program trains leading farmers in communities to build greenhouses, create organic pesticides, and produce natural fertilizers. The farmers return to their communities and share what they learned, so that knowledge of sustainable practices can spread beyond the direct recipients of training.
The training this week focused on LandPKS Soil ID and on gathering observations about soil color, texture, and rock fragments with minimal equipment. These fundamental aspects of soil help farmers understand their soil’s capacity to hold water and nutrients and make other key land management decisions. Agroecology Field Trainer Frank Portillo explains they collect soil information like “texture, structure, water retention capacity, effective depth, porosity and compaction to take into account what agroecological practices to use and how convenient it is to incorporate certain crops into the system.” LandPKS Soil ID provides user-friendly methods for gathering soil data, and helps users identify soil types by comparing their on-site measurements to data found in soil maps.
“At Sustainable Harvest International, soil analysis guides our approach to sustainable agriculture with smallholders,” said Joel Castillo, Country Representative for Honduras at SHI. “LandPKS allows us to better understand the constraints and potential of each plot, supporting agricultural interventions that improve productivity, conserve soil, and strengthen family livelihoods.”
