Soils, Food and Healthy Communities Organization
(Malawi)

Soils, Food and Healthy Communities (SFHC) Organization

Founded in 2000, SFHC has evolved into a farmer-led non-profit organisation that aims to increase the amount of locally grown nutritious food, promote environmentally friendly farming practices, and develop healthy communities.

The Eurofins Foundation supports SFHC's project to improve nutrition, gender equality, and wellbeing for 500 food-insecure farming households in Malawi. This participatory project responds to the intersecting challenges of food insecurity, poor health and nutrition, and poor soil health, exacerbated by climate change and underlying gender inequalities.

In 2020/ 2021, Eurofins Foundation's funding allowed SFHC to host agroecology, gender equity, and nutrition training with over 500 farmers from across seven village areas and distribute seeds to over 500 new farmers. These trainings gave farmers the necessary knowledge to improve their soil fertility, boost production, and increase their access to nutritionally dense foods.

By including gender training as part of their educational package, SFHC also encouraged social justice within farming communities, by following a curricula that challenge rigid gender roles. The funding helped disseminate more information to stakeholders such as policymakers, funders, researchers, and other groups whose continued support serves SFHC's mission. Results have demonstrated that this method helps redistribute household labour, incorporate men into caregiving roles, and support equitable decision-making power in households.

As a result, farmers reported widespread legume planting, culinary lessons, and implementation of agroecological training, focusing on the development of women and young people.

In 2021 / 2022, Eurofins Foundation further supported SFHC and Malawian farmers in achieving cooperative independence

The funding provided by the foundation allowed SFHC to host agroecology, gender equity, and nutrition trainings to farmers from around the catchment area. They also distributed seeds as their overall objective is to help farmers improve their food security and nutrition while improving environmental indicators such as soil quality and biodiversity.  These trainings allowed SFHC to serve over 300 new farmers with information that will empower them to improve their soil fertility, boost production, and have more access to nutritionally dense foods. By including gender trainings as part of the educational package, SFHC also encouraged social justice within farming communities. The funding has helped disseminate more information to different stakeholders such as policy makers, funders, researchers, and other groups whose continued support serves SFHC’s mission.

In 2022/2023, the Eurofins Foundation renews its support to SFHC.

This project contributes to the following United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals