CDP PROJECT #2 — INDIA The future of agricultural farming communities is growing increasingly uncertain as farmers – especially in women-led communities like the tea region of Kumaon, India – face economic challenges and the hard realities of climate change that degrade the soil, priming it for landslides during monsoon season. To address these vulnerabilities, Frontier Co-op has partnered with Young Mountain Tea (YMT), a tea trading partner of Frontier Co-op since 2018, to establish the first farmer-owned tea processing facility in Kumaon. Each smallholder farmer in the community – 90% of whom are women – own a stake in the collective, and will receive approxi- mately five times the commodity rates and dividends from processing. The first facility will process and bag eight kinds of tea and ultimately benefit 500 farmers in the community. If expanded, the model could benefit up to 6,000 farmers in the region, driving economic growth, improving soil health, and combatting the local effects of climate change. And the impact is not just economic. Of equal if not greater significance, the hope and confidence of farmers that were on the brink of leaving farming due to the increasing barriers, is returning as they learn that the deeply meaningful, cultural practice of growing and harvesting tea in the region can continue.
CDP PROJECT #1 — SRI LANKA Sri Lanka is renowned for black pepper, nutmeg, cloves, and cinnamon. Despite the country’s production of high-quality materials, Sri Lankan farmers have faced significant barriers that have prevented them from getting their spices into the global marketplace. Primarily, they’ve lacked the infrastructure and training required to meet food safety standards and regulations, particularly those introduced by the U.S. Food Safety Modern- ization Act (FSMA) passed in 2011. FSMA shifted food safety laws from a response-based approach to a prevention-based approach with more oversight along every part of the supply chain. As buyers increasingly moved business away from Sri Lanka, the farmers lost financial resources necessary to improve their operations. So, Frontier Co-op, through the USAID CDP Program, partnered with the Small Organic Farmers Association (SOFA) – a Sri Lankan cooperative made up of more than 3,500 spice, tea, coconut, and herb farmers in Sri Lanka’s central region – to change this. The team began by improving SOFA’s internal cooperative management, conducting agri- cultural extension training in best practices for farming, handling, and processing, and equipping a processing facility for FSMA-compliant production. Since the project’s inception, 1,203 small organic farmers have benefited. They’ve improved their crop yields and gained greater access to the marketplace.
Photo (left above): A group of tea farmers poses for a photo in the rural Himalayas. 90% of the farmers in this region are women. Photo (right above): A farmer plucks tea leaves in a Kumaon, India tea garden. 2024 Sustainability Report | 34
Photo (left above): Frontier Co-op CEO Tony Bedard inspects a healthy pepper vine at a demonstration farm in Sri Lanka. Photo (right above): An agricultural extension worker provides a training to rural farmers in Sri Lanka.
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