Civil society organizations: farmer
Location: Lao PDR
Fact sheet: Download
Bounleua, Bounleua Farm Owner
Bounleua Manichanh started her farm since when she was 12 years old with her parents. Her parents have been doing organic farming. Currently, Bounleua still doing organic gardening; she has been trained on organic farming by Huam Jai Asasamak Association (HJA). Bounleua starts planting vegetables in early September to June of each year she grows vegetables near her home. Since she joined Engaging Rural Lao Youths to Promote Community – based Organic Vegetable Farming to Mitigate Impacts of Agrochemicals Project. she mostly grows leafy and heads vegetables. As a beneficiary, she has received much support including technical training, marketing network and agricultural inputs from HJA and SGP – GEF fund. She notices that organic vegetable production has a huge impact on her family. It reduces product cost, brings good health and generates a decent small income to support her family.
Bounleua gardening did not perform well, because the area she used to the garden was steep, while the March-May period had no water to be used since her garden was dependent on rainwater and the crop production depends heavily on organic fertilizers from her animals. However, her farm contains a wide range of crop species including vegetables, herbs, and fruit trees which complies well with the agroecological principles. Overall, in order to improve the agro-ecological sustainability in her farm, Bounleua needs to be more independent of the essential farm inputs.
Bounleua family has been eating and growing vegetables with no chemicals, her future plans will be to continue to grow and sell chili peppers to export to the agricultural markets in Xiengkhuoang city.