FARMING
COLLECTIVE
What We Do.
COFIA’s Farming Collective and Field Farmer Training Programs provide smallholder farmers in rural communities with access to land, inputs, improved crop varieties, training, better informed extension and advisory services, marketing and community support.
The Farming Collective’s first season began with 20 women planting in September 2019 and ended with a bountiful January 2020 harvest. Farming was centered around two villages—Peta and Rubongi—about 10 miles from the town of Tororo in Eastern Uganda.
COFIA has introduced modern farming practices to a region with a population of 10,000 people, most living in small villages. Residents here live off the land they farm, generating very little income because their seeds are depleted or plants diseased. Healthy seeds, farming implements, fertilizer and pesticides are beyond their economic reach.
Today, (July 2022), 60 women farmers—a number we are on track to grow to hundreds, then thousands of women—have completed at least three seasons of farming.
How It Works.
COFIA is a social enterprise, changing the world for the better. Like traditional businesses, COFIA aims to make a profit, but 100% of those profits are reinvested or donated to create positive social change. Here’s how the farming collective makes COFIA’s social enterprise possible:
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With a focus on women, COFIA chooses smallholder farmers to participate in the collective (Started with 20 farmers in 2019, adding as we are able.)
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Each season, collective farmers receives a farming “kit”—purchased locally— which includes seeds, fertilizer, pesticides and tools. An acre of land, leased from local landholders, is also provided. Plowing is conducted by local farmers with oxen.
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Collective farmers receive training and are responsible for planting, managing and harvesting their own crops. Much of this work is done collaboratively between farmers in the collective. Existing farmers train new farmers as they enter the collective.
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Harvests are collected combined, stored, processed (if necessary) and marketed by COFIA.
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Profits from sale of crops are reinvested in the system to allow progressively more farmers to join the collective.
Who Benefits?
The primary beneficiaries are the farmers and their families, which typically include four to five children. Seventeen women finished our first season with a one-acre crop of maize each. Two of the women lost their crops when their fields flooded. One woman stopped farming mid-season. In future seasons, COFIA will sell crops at market and proceeds will go to the farmers.
Smallholder farmers, especially women:
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Adoption of sustainable agriculture practices
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Lower production costs
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Reduced waste and pollution of natural resources
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Reduced post-harvest losses and waste
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Higher crop yields
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Healthier, high-value yields
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Higher incomes/financial stability
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More empowered women
Farmers’ families and children:
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Sustainable food security
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Increased access and availability to healthy food options
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Enhanced child nutrition and health
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Enhanced livelihoods
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Reduced child hunger in school
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Improved economic security
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More responsible food consumption
The Community
Local tool vendors, owners of oxen used for plowing, landholders who lease acres to COFIA and neighbors who learn better farming practices all benefit from our work.