Saifana Organic Farm
Short description of your place and practices
Regenerate a degraded land.
Saifana used to be an abandoned cashew tree orchard and most of the land comprises of rocks and very little top soil. Each year, a long drought arrives at the end of April, and stays all the way through to December. Having almost no access to water, many people have asked us "Why on Earth would you want to farm this land?". With no background in farming or gardening whatsoever, we started to read books on permaculture, agroecology and regenerative farming. We quickly understood that the first step to regenerative farming is to build a healthy soil. A soil full of microorganisms, that absorbs water and nutrients is essential to growing tasty organic crops and fight against drought.
GROWING ORGANIC VEGGIES
From there the journey began, we gathered logs, branches, twigs, leaves from the farm and its surroundings to create permanent layered beds that would eventually transform into soil rich in organic matter and life. Over the years, as material decomposed the beds have become more productive. Each year, the soil structure changes and its capacity to hold water grows, which allows us to farm further into the seasonal drought. Today, we grow a variety of seasonal crops like okra, tomatoes, eggplant, chili, cucumber, beans as well as many leafy greens that we used directly in our farm to table meals.
PLANTING A FOOD FOREST
The food forest is a perennial system in which more than 80% of the plants and trees are edible. It is inspired by the forest in the sense that plants and trees all grow harmoniously together at a high density. Every layer of the system is occupied by a specific crop. On top trees are grown at different heights, coconut trees are emergents, mango trees as a high canopy, longan as a lower canopy and below that shrubs and roots that can thrive with less sunlight. At Saifana, our newly planted food forest is slowly developing and we are learning which plants are best suited for our region.