After testing the effectiveness of the technique, we move on to the phase of creating a chain of production

Neem oil is a vegetable oil obtained from the seeds of the neem tree used in natural insecticides and a number of preventive uses

The Planet Farmer's team is trained in market gardening on the Zionnou experimental farm

Alongside very lucrative market gardening for farmers in the off-season

They are 3 technicians in agriculture, with strong experience in the field but not especially in market gardening, of which they have more theoretical than practical knowledge. For 3 months they have been experimenting with market gardening on the Zionnou experimental farm.

It is a question of growing varieties of vegetables adapted to the soil and the climatic conditions of the area.

With a dual objective: Then train farmers to produce vegetables in addition to their usual production (maize, rice, cowpea, cotton) to improve their family's diet and diversify their sources of income; ensure production on the Zionnou farm off-season and thanks to drilling, which generates income for Planète Paysans and thus ensures a self-financing part of the program.

4,500 plants distributed to farmers in 2021:

• Moringa

Originally from India but now well established in Africa, this small, fast-growing tree flourishes in particularly dry and arid soils. Everything is good in moringa: its roots, its fruits, its seeds, its bark and especially its leaves with their impressive mineral and vitamin density. They contain the majority of minerals and vitamins that the body needs, in very high quantities! At equal weight, this super-food contains as much protein as in a beef steak, 4 times more calcium than in cow's milk, 9 times more vitamin C than in kiwi, 4 times more vitamin A than in carrot and as much magnesium as in dark chocolate! The moringa did not steal its nicknames "tree of life" or "tree of miracles".

• Neem

Neem (Magousier) is a fast-growing tree, which can reach a height of 20 meters, very present in the country (TOGO). Its foliage is evergreen and provides excellent shade.

White, fragrant protandrous flowers appear from January to May. The fruit is a drupe resembling an olive which peeled, the almond will be used to produce Neem oil. The fruit, the leaves have a well-known insecticidal action in India. It can be used as a natural pesticide (azadirachtin)

• Papaya

The papaya tree is afruit treerevergreen from tropical regions. Flowering continues throughout the year. The fruit, the papaya appears directly on the trunk. The papaya tree has food and medicinal uses. Stem and bark fibers can also be usedes for making ropes. Papayas are rich inpapainand vitamins.

• Gmelina Arborea or White Teak

Thisfast growing treeand foliageobsolete, of voluminous size is used in reforestation (necessary in Togo) and in demarcation of fields also for the construction and the manufacture of furniture.

A tractor and its tools (rotovator, mower, seeder, weeder, tipper) and tiller arrived on site in 2021.

The agricultural equipment expected  2 years was able to arrive despite difficult conditions linked to the pandemic, and the problems of customs clearance encountered. The materials sold locally are all imported and their reliability is not excellent or financially unaffordable.

Allowing to greatly reduce the hardship of workpeasants, especially women (here sowing maize) the use of a tractor and agricultural tools is todayan essential mechanism to make the transition to agro-ecological agriculture possible.

Young people leave for the cities and there are fewer and fewer day laborers. Due to a lack of manpower, farmers therefore resort to chemical herbicides to weed the fields or to weed. Those who cannot afford herbicides practice bruly. This ancestral technique, by reducing grasses to ashes instead of burying them, reduces the supply of organic matter to the soil and causes bush fires which destroy young tree seedlings and intensify deforestation.

Planète Paysans therefore offers small farmers the possibility of renting tractors with tools and the driver for a cost of use identical to that of the purchase of chemicals and daily labour.