When we first introduced Fundación Pachamama’s Farmer Field Schools earlier this year, we shared a vision for strengthening food security in the Ecuadorian Amazon by centering local knowledge, community leadership, and regenerative farming practices. Now, that vision is taking root.

In August, Fundación Pachamama celebrated 19 graduation events across 30 communities, marking the completion of the 2025–2026 Farmer Field School cycle for 883 chakramamas and chakrayayas, women and male farmers.

But graduation is not the end of the journey. It marks a new stage of putting knowledge into practice, sharing it within communities, and continuing to learn from the land.

Learning by Doing

Throughout the cycle, farmers worked alongside community facilitators and technical teams through hands-on learning and participatory research. Together, they explored practical questions around soil health, crop productivity, biodiversity, and the use of locally produced bio-inputs. The approach creates space for farmers to experiment, observe, and adapt practices to the realities of their own chakras—building on knowledge that already exists within each community.

From Research to the Chakra

In Napo, participatory research reached 200 chakras across 23 communities and seven parishes, helping families better understand soil conditions and the productivity of key crops.

The findings are brought back to the communities, where they can inform decisions on the ground—from improving soil fertility and strengthening crop diversity to producing biofertilizers with locally available materials.

This is where the Farmer Field Schools’ approach comes to life: research meets ancestral knowledge, and learning becomes practice.

Technical research can help identify patterns and measure change, while generations of Amazonian knowledge offer a deeper understanding of the chakra as a living, diverse, and interconnected system.

The 883 graduates represent a significant milestone, but the learning continues. Fundación Pachamama will provide ongoing technical support in the field, helping farmers reinforce, adapt, and share what they have learned.

Through this continued accompaniment, the chakra becomes more than a place of production. It becomes a classroom, a research space, and a living source of knowledge for the future of the Amazon.