Tucked away in a small community called Sitio Nuevo, El Salvador, a small demonstration garden, DEMOSFE, has become an important agricultural resource for locals in the area. DEMOSFE is part of GOD’s agricultural program that operates in the Latin American region.

If you were to walk around the various small communities in this part of El Salvador, you would notice that many living areas around individual homes are packed full of small backyard gardens. Generally, these gardens are dominated by vegetable and floral arrangements, with a touch of a free-range chicken--the purest sense of the management style. It seems rare to find a yard not overshadowed by a mango tree threatening to drop a mango at the slightest breeze haphazardly. These small yards are frequently paralleled by small (perhaps 1 acre) fields containing cattle, sugar cane, corn, and other commodity crops. DEMOSFE exists on a campus significantly larger than most yards but is of a satisfactory size to demonstrate a garden site used for marketable products, not just backyard gardens.

Several distinctives set DEMOSFE apart from other similar garden operations.

First and foremost, DEMOSFE is an entirely organic operation.

From soil fertility to disease and pest control, processes exist to ensure that the prevailing synthetic methods of crop maintenance are never used. This is true for both the garden and the beautiful tree crops and aesthetic details around the campus.

Second, DEMOSFE has employed a unique method of capturing and cultivating soil microorganisms, which form the backbone of its soil fertility maintenance regimen.

This is noteworthy for several reasons. First, microorganisms exist all around our living environments. They are certainly some of the main players in a natural environment. Generally, microorganisms' primary purpose is to recycle nutrients back into the soil for uptake by living organisms. These microorganisms are workhorses for composting and nutrient balancing and availability in dense concentrations. So, not only are they readily available at no commercial cost to any farmer, but they’re also useful in speeding up composting processes that otherwise make them infeasible to farmers interested in switching to an organic setup.

Another distinctive to DEMOSFE is its ability to implement different experiments.

These experiments take place all over the garden in different forms. On repetition, new varieties of crops are constantly rotated in and out, seeking out the varieties that perform well in this microclimate. These details are recorded for the purpose of recommendations and seed-saving efforts. Other experiments include various ways to manage tomato plants and changing the ingredients in the compost piles to determine how different variables affect the microorganism solution employed. Notes on the compost processes are important because the materials available to a farmer will change from farm to farm and season to season. Currently, they are experimenting with corn cobs as an alternative carbon source. It is thought that the porosity of the corn cobs will facilitate a suitable environment for the microbes to colonize and break down slowly.

The food produced out of DEMOSFE goes to various places.

Much of it is consumed by those living on campus. When there is a large harvest, the produce is listed on a community text feed for those living in the area to purchase. Often, produce is taken charitably to the homes of widows and the elderly. At various points throughout the day, neighbors come by for batches of cilantro, tomatoes, and lettuce. At other times, buckets of the microorganism liquid are given to those interested in boosting their compost pile. DEMOSFE is known for being a resource of healthy food and natural growing techniques.

On a weekly basis, campus personnel spend an afternoon outside their campus helping other families. Our team performed a service project at a property used by an older woman in a neighboring community. She is setting up a greenhouse at this property to begin the cultivation of many staple vegetables and the lucrative production of Roses. She is a part of a cooperative of other women in her community making this project get off the ground.

Our task was to boost her project by creating a fermented Bokashi fertilizer pile. I estimate this pile had approximately 1000 lbs of dry material gathered and deposited at the property before our arrival. The various ingredients in the pile were layered in a giant dry heap. From there, the pile required about 100 gallons of water inoculated with the microorganism liquid manufactured at the DEMOSFE garden site. All the dry ingredients and liquids were mixed with shovels until thoroughly saturated. By the time we had finished, this woman had access to a 2000lb microbial powerplant for use in her new garden space. Not only was this community service project impactful for an elder’s community garden, but it was also an opportunity to practice the task of sharing an agricultural technology that is appropriate for use in the area due to its low cost and locality of available materials.  

DEMOSFE has become a vital community resource. Its reputation is growing as a place to find healthy food. It establishes itself as proof that an organic operation is feasible for the small farmer. It is a hub for exchanging sustainable growing technologies. It is a source of help and hope for those outside campus through community service activities. I am excited to watch DEMOSFE grow in its capacity to deliver life-saving methods and foods. Be on the lookout for demonstrations of some of the technologies outlined above on GOD’s Nashville campus at Hopewell Gardens!