Environmental Sustainability

In Malawi, a business owner is using her social enterprise to help diversify incomes in her community – and it's helping rejuvenate a depleted Lake Malawi.

A cacao farmer in Nicaragua reaches the global stage as his chocolate rolls off a conveyor belt in Denmark. But not everything goes as planned. It isn’t long before climate change tests his resilience.

Millions of cups of coffee are consumed every day by people around the world. Read about the benefits of coffee to people, communities, and the planet.

Around the world, climate change is making it more difficult for smallholder farmers to grow coffee. Take our quiz to find out what kind of coffee fits you best, then learn how TechnoServe is helping preserve this coffee through improving farmers’ resilience to climate threats.

COVID-19 was just the latest challenge for small-scale farmers in central Mexico. With limited technical knowledge and market connections, many have struggled for years to improve their incomes. José García Martínez was one of those farmers when he joined a TechnoServe program a year ago. Today, he is earning enough to provide security and better opportunities for his family—“a life-changing experience.”

Across West Africa, food security is being challenged by armed struggles and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, which will create long-lasting challenges. Amaka Ikeaka, regional program manager for West Africa, writes about how dairy production and other long-term solutions can help address these challenges, particularly in Nigeria.

In part one of this new three-part series, Crop to Cup, learn how farmers in East Africa play a role in the coffee that ends up in consumers’ cups around the world, no matter how you take your coffee. Look out for parts two and three, which cover processing and quality control.

Temperatures are rising, the nutritional value of food is declining, and food systems are strained. Climate change is at the core of many food security challenges. How should we respond? Although the challenges ahead are daunting, there’s hope.

Progress Chisenga is a former TechnoServe Fellow who worked in Mozambique in late 2019 through early 2020, where she worked on a project supporting rice and vegetable farmers in Mozambique. In this Q&A, Progress shares her thoughts about the experience and the future.

In an important ecological buffer zone of northeastern Honduras, farmers are learning how to improve their coffee productivity while preserving the natural landscape. A TechnoServe program helped farmers raise productivity by 200% while still ensuring the environmental sustainability of the largest protected land in the country.