Britos-Granja La Orientala

From Switzerland to Uruguay to become farmers

In 2012, we moved from Switzerland to the rural area of Montevideo in Uruguay to start over as farmers in the small Britos family estate. A biologist and an actor, we chose to quit our jobs (and many comforts of Swiss life) to learn something new and to contribute to a project about which we are passionate and which we believe to be valuable for the community.

What we do?

A few miles from the birthplace of tango, in the suburban area of «Manga», we are farming seven hectares of land. It’s a mosaic of highly diversified farming practices that harmonically combine season vegetables, a variety of orchards, and laying hens. This situation is almost unique in Uruguay, where in 2015 the dominant transgenic monocultures covered as much as 1,6 million hectares of transgenic soy and sweetcorn crops, mostly produced with Monsanto seeds and maintained with the worst agro-toxic substances of the same company.

We supply an organic shop in downtown Montevideo (Producers Cooperative) three times a week, a produce home delivery service once a week,and every Sunday you can find us at our booth at the Montevideo organic market.

Why a Crowdfounding campaign?

After two years of training and daily practice, we identified a number of investments and measures that would help us improve and increase our production of vegetables, fruit and eggs. Such an increase meets the demand of our customers, which is currently far higher than our production capacity.

The crowdfunding campaign that we are launching aims to improve what already exists and to enhance and boost the production of the land that we cultivate with love and dedication day after day. With your help we could do better and more and demonstrate that a sustainable and viable agricultural model is feasible and is a response to an existing and growing demand.

With your help we can do better and more

In order to substantially enhance our current organic farming system, we identified three projects aimed at boosting our production while improving the quality of our work. The 16’000 CHF investment capital that is required.

We aim to

• Increase the number of our hens from 30 to 180

After experimenting for one year with a small mobile henhouse, we realized that hens make a huge contribution to the life cycle of an organic production such as ours, as they: are effective in pest management, they fertilize the soil, eat the grass and produce organic eggs

• Set up an irrigation system for our orchards

Our orange, tangerine and lemon trees have reached fruit-bearing age. To improve the quantity and regularity of their production,we now need a water well and an individual irrigation system for each tree.

• Buy and set up a warehouse for storing equipment and vegetables

Our current warehouse no longer complies neither with hygienic nor safety standards (we live after all in the outskirts of a Latin American city and are unfortunately at risk of equipment or produce theft), beside being inconvenient for the farmers (too narrow, too dark and too small).

Why support us?

… support a farming system that is family-based, bio-diverse and eco-friendly, a true model for Uruguay (andbeyond) that is still known and applied by few, but which is raising increasing interest. We regularly open our doors to trainees and voluntary workers; 4 times a year, we welcome the agronomy students of Montevideo Public University. We consider it our duty to disseminate our know-how of the management of natural processes.

… oppose the monocultural monopoly that dominates Uruguay (and beyond) by enabling a small business to considerably enhance its production, while also making organic local food available to more people who would otherwise not have access to it.

… create a few additional and highly needed qualified jobs

Rewards