19 March, 2015
SANTO DOMINGO- On March 19, 2015, thte Batey Relief Alliance (BRA) Dominicana, along with the Dominican Ministry of Agriculture, representatives of the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), and various other local collaborators from the agricultural and non-profit sectors will meet in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic to celebrate the closing of the organization’s ambitious “Sembrando Vidas” agricultural project which was implemented in the border community of Rio Limpio, province Elias Pina for the last 12 months.
Using intense best practice training, capacity building, cooperative management, and organic production techniques, “Sembrando Vidas” ensured that the Rio Limpio farming community had the needed tools to rebuild their farms and reinvigorate the economy.
“The results of this project surpassed all projections from the Ministry of Agriculture or USDA benchmarks,” said Maria Virtudes Berroa, BRA’s Executive Director. She added that by the end of the project year, the organization trained 58% more producers than originally planned who, in turn, planted more than 15 acres of quality organic coffee available for sale and export.
According to Ms. berroa, every training and capacity building exercises were done with the goal of creating a community of producers capable of exporting quality organic produce and generating income for their families and that the COOPROVALE, is now a stable, independent and a functioning agricultural cooperative with the capacity to grow and expand their production level with proper investment.
In addition to the agricultural capacity building, BRA addressed the health and nutritional needs of the local populations by distributing 45,000 tablets of multivitamins and food supplements to malnourished children and pregnant and nursing women.
BRA hopes that this project is only the beginning for the community of Rio Limpio, whose residents have been motivated and invigorated to continue to expand their agricultural business for the benefit of their families. They hope that with a continued investment and support, Rio Limpio can remain a competitive producer of quality organic products in the Dominican Republic for years to come. In FY2009-2011, BRA received funding from the USDA to develop in the “bateyes” first agricultural cooperative program producing high quality crops and animals to feed 35,000 people in the province of Monte Plata.
