CELL Sustainability Through Community

Dave O: CELL´s semester program in Central America focuses on a theme of sustainability through community. During the course of the semester, we visit a variety of communities striving to become more sustainable. Yesterday, we visited one of the world´s unique sustainable communities - Selva Negra - a sustainable farm, resort, and organic coffee estate nestled in a virgin cloud forest in the mountains of Matagalpa, Nicaragua. This ecologically focused farm is an inspriring example of how people can live sustainably with ecological, social, and economic balance. In 2007, Selva Negra was voted the most sustainable farm in the world by the SCAA, an association of sustainable farms and ecologically focused communities.

Selva Negra has been run by the same family for four generations. They own 400 hectares of cloud forest at an elevation between 4,000 to 5,000 feet above sea level. They have committed to preserving over 130 hectares of virgin forest, some of the most biologically diverse land in the world. To illustrate the richness of this land, one hectare in the cloud forest of Selva Negra contains more biodiversity than all the land in any one country in Europe.

What makes this eco-farm/village so unique? The short answer is their commitment to sustainablity. They are committed to maintaining the farm and the estate in as ecologically pure way as possible. They grow organic coffee under the canopy of a section of the cloud forest that is not in the preserve. They use only organically produced fertilizers composted onsite, no toxic chemicals, pesticides, or fertilizers. They grow 100 percent of their own food organically: including all vegetables, poultry, eggs, pork, etc. They raise organic flowers for sale. They raise bees that polinate their crops and produce honey for the farm workers and for sale in their onsite tienda. They raise organically fed cows that produce all dairy products, including a variety of world-class cheese also available for sale in the tienda. They generate electricy from their own hydro power plant. They compost all waste and use the compost as organic fertilizer in their gardens and on their coffee plants. They produce biogas from the coffee pulp waste. They treat their workers with love and respect and provide schooling, clean housing, and health care for their families.

As Eddy and Mausi Kuhl, the husband and wife team who run the eco-village, say: We maintain a an ecological and social balance so that in 100 years this farm will be the way it is today. We allow the virgin forest to remain the way it is and it creates a micro climate, giving us the water of life necessary for our farm operation. This wouldn´t work, however, if we were just to protect the environment for itself. The land has to produce an income. It has to be productive in harmony with the environment. There are two basic ways that we produce income: 1) through exporting our coffee and other organically grown products, and 2) importing eco-tourism. It all works together to help us sustain ourselves: ecologically, socially, economically. We sell our coffee to Whole Foods in the U.S., and they pay a higher price for our product because it is grown organically and sustainably. But none of this would be sustainable if we didn´t produce a high quality product. You students come from the U.S. You can go home and teach your country how to live sustainably. (Eddy): I think the mission of the U.S. should be to live in peace with its neighbors.

We agree with Eddy and Mausi!