The Café de Maraba washing station in Rwanda’s Huye province served as a mock-amphitheater this past week, host to the launching of the Black Earth Project. Funded by Green Mountain Coffee Roasters and through partnership with Radio Lifeline, re:char trained twelve Rwandan coffee farmers and agronomists to be biochar ambassadors to 12,000+ growers across six represented cooperatives. [...]
We are excited to announce our partnership with Green Mountain Coffee Roasters–makers of Keurig– and Radio Lifeline. The Black Earth Project will bring re:char’s award-winning Climate Kiln technology to coffee and pyrethrum farmers in Rwanda. Together, we will launch a revolution and open up new markets for biochar. One day, your coffee could be [...]
After posting our results from our second season test plots in Kenya, we received a wide range of commentary. While it was nearly all positive, some people did not quite understand the impact of these results. We’ve tried to clarify the information below, and present what we feel are the most important results from this [...]
This past week we harvested our second round of biochar test plots. We planted sorghum using the same techniques and nutrient inputs as we did with finger millet during the long rains season. The primary difference this round was that we did not add any new biochar. That means the biochar + human urine solution [...]
Hosted by CIAT (International Center for Tropical Agriculture) and the University of Nairobi, hundreds of the foremost soil scientists in the world gathered in Nairobi this past week to discuss the interlinked issues of tropical soil degradation, poor yields, and environmental sustainability. At the center of a number of the discussions was how biochar fits in [...]
Entrepreneurs often speak of ‘crossing the chasm’ with regards to launching new technologies. The now-ubiquitous iPhone was once a niche product, prized by early adopters but not yet mainstream. Biochar faces a similar challenge– A handful of visionaries from various geographies have recognized the potential of this farming technique and adopted it. Everyday, these leaders [...]
The short rains planting season is well under way in Bungoma and many of our customers are reaping the benefits of biochar for their second season – in most cases benefiting from biochar they applied the prior season. This is one of the qualities of biochar we are evaluating in our second round of test [...]
At re:char we give oil drums a second chance to do something helpful for the environment. Below is how this happens. Kibuye Market – Kisumu, Kenya. Kibuye is a jua kali haven; a place where local metalworkers thrive. It’s also the place where our good friend Fred works. Fred ships emptied oil drums from the [...]
… is about as concise a way as possible to sum up our most recent round of customer testimonials. A few profiles below. Patrick Walela Farming Experience: 10 years Family: Patrick has a wife and nine children, eight of whom are in school. Farm: Patrick and his family farm one acre of land. They grow [...]
We are big fans of developing business strategies from empirical data. This can be a bit challenging when working in rural Kenya with what are typically painfully inconsistent data sources. Nevertheless we’ve managed to have some success. Each time we make a sale we collect information from our new customer – simple things like crops [...]
