La Junquera Route to Discovery

La Junquera farm hosted a first open day on the 9th of February with the goal of presenting the regenerative projects that are being conducted by students from Regeneration Academy and to show the project at Altiplano Ecosystem Restoration Camp to those interested.

What inspired us most today is to learn from young people with different realities and new ideas about all these different projects, and to see how they create consciousness about the huge challenges imposed by the loss of fertile soil due to erosion, thereby contributing to awakening society’s curiosity.

- reflection of some of the visitors -

There was an amazing attendance of 67 people with a wide variety of visitors: younger and older visitors, farmers, agrarian consultants, students, teachers and a lot in between.

After the plenary welcome visitors embarked their first journey on the La Junquera route to discovery: a guided tour alongside the plots where several students from Regeneration Academy have been conducting experiments for their research projects. Themes that have been touched upon during the tour were dam building, swales and keylines as anti-erosion measures, groundcover around pistachio trees and aquatic life as indicators of water quality. After having enjoyed a marvelous lunch prepared by BioSegura with local organic products, visitors were guided around the Altiplano Ecosystem Restoration Camp.

More than just being an occasion where knowledge was exchanged one-sidedly with the visitors, the open day was an invitation to actively and interactively participate and be part of a collective learning journey. As such, visitors constructed a natural dam to slow down water speed, experienced the positive effects of swales and keylines as an answer to water induced erosion, conducted visual soil assessments to see the positive effects of groundcover, assessed water quality in the pond by means of indicator species and planted sixty almond trees.

Do you also feel inspired to be part of our collective learning journey? Find us on Facebook, Instagram or LinkedIn and stay in touch!

And stay tuned for our next event!

Author: Laura Bello Cartagena

Sanne Kruijt