CIRAD agronomy workshop in Jambi: Trainees looking at soil sample
Abstract
This series of photographs was shot on October 29-30, 2019, in Jambi province (Sumatra). I was invited by CIRAD researchers, Jean Ollivier and Alexis Thoumazeau, to attend a workshop in Agronomy they organized in Petaling Jaya, about 50 kilometers South of Jambi city, as part of one of their research projects on the environmental effects of different oil palm cultivation practices in the area. The workshop gathered smallholders from a cooperative, rural development NGO field workers, and University professors. The pictures show participants going through in-class discussions of the stakes of agronomic analysis and presentations of methods to analyze soils and plants, and then participating to on-field demonstrations of these methods. I coordinate the research project EXPALMIND on the effects of plantation agriculture on land use and food security, funded by the Mutalim CNRS-INRAE fund in 2019-2021, and this project involved geographers from CNRS-LETG and CIRAD-Systèmes de pérennes, and my participation was part of that project.