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The farm
“Deysi” is located at two hours from the capital city,
Managua, in Nicaragua. It is exactly located in the
community of La Grecia, in the municipality of El Viejo
in Chinandega.
The farm
“Deysi”, besides having an amazing landscape, surrounded
by San Cristóbal and El Chonco volcanos in one of its
borders, has made important progress at the present
there are about 60 hectares cultivated with improved
grass, it has a milking room, a ten-hectare lot
cultivated with sugar cane that is starting to germinate
and more well fed head of cattle that have increased
milk production in the farm.
Nubia
Esperanza Baca Martínez, owner of the farm and leader of
the Cattle Raiser Demonstrative Group of La Grecia said,
“We have learned to value our farms and the richness we
have in them. We are making calcualtions and struggling
to make it more profitable.All of this, thanks to the
support that we are receiving from the Millenium
Challenge Corporation".
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Development of the cattle raiser conglomerate
CRM
Nicaragua through the cattle operator
TechnoServe/UNAN-León/CARE is working with small
cattle raisers who are organized in 52
demostrative groups, having training sessions,
giving technical assistance and providing
supplies to guarantee the good quality of their
products. |
Ms. Nubia
Baca considers that one of the most valuable
achievements resulting from the technical assistance,
training sessions and supplies provided by the Millenium
Challenge Corporation and the efforts made to develop
the cattle activity, is that any of her animals died
last summer as she had enough improved hay to feed them
and give them the right nutrients during this dry
season.
She
asserted, “when I became partner of the Millenium
Challenge Corporation I started planting improved grass
on my lands.
One part of it was given by the program and the other
part I planted it with my own effort. Now, on daily
basis I chop it and prepare food for my cattle. The
results are great because before my cattle got sick and
four or six animals died because of malnutrition. We
were not prepared, but now we do not have any losses.”
Moreover,
this producer, who took over the farm management after
her husband´s death a year and a half ago, obtained a
daily milk production of 80 liters, 50 % more than last
summer when she had not implemented the recommendations
given by the Program technicians. During winter, she
keeps her milk production a little above the 100 liters
every day.
In the mornings, Ms. Nubia Baca has some time to sell
cheese, sour cream, curds and curdle milk. She buys milk
from the other partners in her group to collect a
thousand liters which are processed everyday. She pays a
steady price for the milk and provides employment to
eight people. After selling, she goes back to her
business to continue with her cattle activities.
Although she is a certified nurse, her life related to
the cattle activity, activity that her father performed,
made her want to be in the business. She has refined and
widened her knowledge through the CRM training sessions
where she also learned to select the cows for
reproduction and select the ones that are not longer
useful.
According to her, another achievement reached by the
groups is the united work that the producer perform to
turn their farms into profitable businesses through the
technological transformation. She said, “if we are
organized we can buy less expensive supplies, negotiate
with the buyers under better conditions and have a
stable price for the milk in summer as in winter”. |
