Final Report Photo: Bienvenida Bauer Photo by: Bienvenida Bauer Workshop on Capacity Strengthening in Agricultural Best Management Practices for USAID and the Caribbean Implementing Partners Jarabacoa, Dominican Republic July 8th-12th , 2013 Lead by: Co-organized & facilitated by: Contents Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………1 Workshop Methodology Case Studies and Technical Presentation……………………………………………………………………………………………………..1 Field Visits……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………1 Group work………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….2 Data Synthesis………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………...3 Recommendations………………………………………………………………………………………………………3 Workshop Evaluation……..…………………………………………………………………………………………..3 Annexes: Workshop Agenda…………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…….…….4-8 BMP’s Workshop Synthesis……………………………………………………………………………………………….……..… 9-14 General BMP’s Matrix………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…….15-22 Country Matrix……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….....23-25 Crop-Specific Matrix……………………………………………………………………………………………………………...…..26-34 Workshop Evaluations & Other Commentaries.……………………………………………………………….……..….35-36 Participants List………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….37-38 Introduction The workshop was led by REDDOM, with Sun Mountain International as the co-organizer. It was a multi-country initiative with a goal to produce tangible Agricultural Best Management Practices (BMPs) for Caribbean-based existing and future USAID and Government projects working in agriculture and global climate change (GCC) adaptation. It provided project participates an opportunity to collaborate with other organizations in the sharing of lessons learned from the implementation of agriculture/GCC adaption projects. The workshop was designed for agricultural/GCC adaptation project planners and implementers. The purpose of the workshop was to join key players in the Caribbean region to share, and document, agricultural Best Management Practices that focus on adaptation and risk reduction of GCC impacts to agriculture production. The workshop was highly participatory in nature. Each participant was seen as a presenter and each presenter as a participant. The workshop allowed ample time for participant discussions, field visits, and presentations of Case Studies of Agricultural BMPs with a focus on GCC adaptation from the participating countries (Jamaica, Haiti, Dominica and Dominican Republic). USAID DR/REDDOM and Sun Mountain technical specialists provided the workshop materials and facilitated the workshop discussions on BMP strategies. The workshop methodology consisted of Case Study presentations, technical presentations, participant discussions on the information presented, field visits, and small group work sessions to identify and document BMPs. Due to weather conditions, the group was only able to see 4 of the 5 field sites (Constanza greenhouse was the only site that was not visited). Workshop Methodology The workshop opened with an overview of the current situation of Agricultural Projects in the Dominican Republic and USAID priorities in the LAC region. Sustainable farming systems and how they adapt to Climate Change was presented in an introductory video. Case Studies and Technical Presentation Each participating country presented case studies on a variety of topics. The case studies were accompanied by technical presentations which elaborated on the best agricultural management practices for that topic. The following case studies and associated technical presentations were presented: • Aquaponics - Jamaica / Use of the water, irrigation methods and sustainability • Drought management in livestock - Dominican Republic / Global Climate change Adaptation Integrated in Agriculture Projects • Soils, Integrated Nutrient Management including the use of organic methods - Dominican Republic and Dominica / Soils, Integrated Nutrient Management including the use of organic methods • Soil Conservation Management – Haiti / Soil Conservation Management, particularly in hillside agriculture • Integrated Pesticide Management (IPM) - Dominican Republic / Integrated Pesticide Management (IPM) • Additional case study: Climate Change - Dominican Republic This integrated approach of combining real-world experiences (case studies) with in-depth technical presentations, produced useful discussions between the participants as well as best agricultural management practices for each topic. Field Visits Another key part of the workshop strategy was field visits. It was originally planned that participants would visit five sites where agricultural BMP’s were being practiced, those sites and topics were: 1) Belarminio Ramirez y Hnos Coffee Factory – Coffee processing 2) Coffee Nursery – Seedling develop 1 3) Jose Cruz Organic Farm – Organic farming 4) Dajaos / Hnos Ramirez Farm – Organic farming, agro-tourism, and eco-tourism 5) Constanza – Greenhouse production Note: All sites were within one hour of the workshop venue – Jarabacoa, DR Unfortunately, each participant was only able to see two of the five sites due to tropical storm Chantal. On the first field visit day (day 2), the participants were divided into two groups; one group saw Dajaos-Hnos Ramirez Farm and Jose Cruz Organic Farm and the other saw Belarminio Ramirez y Hnos’ Coffee Factory and the Coffee Nursery. Heavy rains made it unsafe to travel to the sites on days three and four. To make sure that the BMP’s from each site were known to all participants, the two groups created brief presentations summarizing their key findings from the sites they visited. They presented the BMP’s for their field visits to the other group. Although the storm prevented visitation to all sites, the important BMP’s from each site were identified and presented, to all the participants, for those four sites. The fifth site to green houses in Constanza (Nunez Agricultural Investments) was completely canceled due to the heavy rains. Group work Maybe the most important element for this workshop was the participatory documentation of the BMP’s. The participants were asked to draw from their professional experiences, case studies, technical presentations, and field visits to complete three types of matrixes: 1) BMP’s Matrix - divides BMP’s into agricultural systems areas (e.g. water conservation, soil conservation, etc.) (Annex 3) 2) Country Matrix - identifies the countries’ crops and the climate change issues that affect those crops (Annex 4) 3) Crop Matrix – identifies the BMP’s and CC issues for a specific crop (Annex 5) The aim of the BMP’s Matrix was to get the participants to document all the BMP’s that they observed during the workshop through case studies, technical presentations, and field visits, as well as their own experiences. The matrix served as the base for the documentation process and identifies the majority of the BMP’s from the workshop. The purpose of the Country Matrix was to identify what crops each participating country was producing and what were the country’s climates change issues that affect their crops. This matrix helped to focus the discussion on the crops that the participants were familiar with, so time would be used more efficiently. The participants, divided into groups by country and used this matrix to identify the climate changes issues in their countries (e.g. intense rainfall, tornados, intense droughts, etc.) While most of the issues were shared by all of the countries, there were some differences. For example, the Dominican Republic reported that Tornados were very problematic while the other countries did not. These climate change issues that the country-groups identified were used in the formulation of the third matrix – crop matrix. To get the participants to think about the BMP’s from a different perspective, a third matrix was used – the Crop Matrix. This matrix took the most common climate change issues that were identified in the Country Matrix and categorized them by crop. Also, this process allowed the participants to think about the BMP’s in a crop-specific-way which produces even more BMP’s, some that were only specific to a certain crop, that were missed in the general BMP’s Matrix. 2 Data Synthesis Utilizing the data collected from the three matrixes the workshop coordination team was able to synthesize the agricultural BMP’s and the corresponding climate change issues into one concise document (Annex 2). Because most of the BMP’s can be implemented with almost any crop, the team decided to organize the document in the following manner: 1) General BMP’s – BMP’s were divided by agricultural systems areas (e.g. water conservation, soil conservation, etc.) for all crops. Under the general areas, sub-sections were added to better define the specific type of BMP. 2) Crop-specific BMP’s – BMP’s that are unique to a certain crop (e.g. cocoa and coffee - grafting of pest and climate resistant species) 3) Common climate changes issues, represented by a,b,c,d,e,f, (e.g. a = Temperature Increase, b = Irregularity in the rainfall season, etc.) were placed with the BMP sub-sections which could help to mitigate the given climate change issue. (e.g. Water harvesting - irregularity in the rainfall season and/or intense droughts) Recommendations The following are recommendations that were made by participants during the workshop for follow up action: • Form technical crop Clusters that would provide follow-ups that would identify gaps in the BMP’s that have been documented for specific crops • Prepare