With the objective of promoting sustainable agriculture and food sovereignty, the local farmers have consolidated a Campesino School of Agroecology, articulating more than 40 peasant organisations from 8 municipalities of the Soto Province, department of Santander. This territory located in the north-eastern region of Colombia is abundant in agro-climatic, cultural and ecological diversity, distributed in the 800 - 2800 Mt. altitude range.
The Agroecological School maintains a program of monthly training sessions in small-hold farms of the community, with the aim to implement and interchange practices "campesino to campesino", including: planning of agro-ecosystems, ecological land management, cropping and livestock diversity, traditional seed banks and appropriate technologies.
Diverse sustainable agriculture is a central feature of food sovereignty, since it can better provide sufficient quantities of affordable and healthy food for all, as well as safeguarding traditional culinary and food-processing skills. Farmer-to-farmer exchanges and collective learning experiences have shown to be an essential factor to social empowerment and to foster the wisdom of traditional farming practices and skills.
