Sustainable Agriculture & Food Security
A six-acre demonstration farm in the Yangon region provides practical, “farmer field school”
residential training courses. These are supplemented with mobile workshops in held other
locations. Farmers learn strategies for boosting crop production and food security and then can
apply the practices on their own plots. Currently, the program is developing a volunteer
extension agent component, with experienced farmers trained to follow up with neighbor
farmers to increase the percentage who successfully adopt the improved practices.
1. Improved Agriculture Techniques
! Specific crop methods for rice, rubber trees, fruits, and vegetables
! Animal Husbandry [pigs and chickens]
! Post-harvest handling and storage [e.g. threshing, drying fruit]
2. Organic Fertilizer: Effective Micro-organism Technology (EM)
! This Japanese technology produces a nutrient-rich, low cost fertilizer that boosts crop
production and improves soil quality. Starter bacteria is combined with local organic
ingredients.
! The EM fertilizer builds up the soil’s beneficial bacteria, so that by the third year’s harvest
production is double what it was prior to using EM.
3. Biogas Technology
! Construction and maintenance techniques for biogas systems to fuel clean cookstoves
*Formerly known as Burma, the name the U.S. government still uses for the countr