Honduras is the second poorest country in Central America. COVID-19 and multiple hurricanes in 2020 exacerbated Honduras’s already high poverty rates, taking the percentage of the population living below the national poverty line from 48.3% in 2018 to 60% in 2024. However, to tackle these rising numbers, recent innovations in poverty eradication in Honduras have focused on agricultural practices and production. 

Nearly a third of Hondurans work in the agricultural sector and nearly half of the population live in rural areas, where the poverty rate is around 75%. From enabling farmers to develop climate-resilient agricultural practices to connecting them with supply chains, here are some examples of agricultural innovations in poverty eradication in Honduras. 

Coffee Farming

The coffee industry is a vital part of Honduras’s rural economy. Indeed, Honduras is the largest coffee producer in Central America and the fifth largest globally, with coffee accounting for 5% of GDP and 23% of exports.

The non-profit organization TechnoServe launched the MOCCA project in 2018 with funding from the USDA. The project has trained more than 11,000 Honduran coffee and cacao farmers to develop climate-resilient agricultural practices. 

In September 2024, TechnoServe launched Avanza Café to build on MOCCA’s success and train 35,000 small producers in regenerative agricultural practices. The project aims to increase yields and household incomes by 25%, while reducing carbon emissions and ensuring that 40% of participants are women and young people. 

Sustainable Practices 

The MAS Project 2.0 works to increase productivity and facilitate access to better markets for Honduran coffee farmers. In 2017, trainers from the program visited the village of Subinara, inhabited by the Indigenous Pech people and located in the Río Plátano Biosphere Reserve, where coffee production is limited to protect the local environment. 

The trainers helped the farmers to establish “climate-smart” practices, such as planting shade trees, using coffee pulp as fertilizer and employing natural pest control solutions. These practices improved production by 200% and increased the community’s profits by 66%.

Access to Markets

The De Mi Tierra program enables farmers to gain direct access to markets, with training by the nonprofit Foundation of Rural Business Development (FUNDER) and distribution across the 46 stores of the La Colonia supermarket chain. 

In cutting out the middleman and enabling farmers, 70% of which are smallholders, to reach larger markets, the De Mi Tierra program improves farmers’ profits and forges domestic supply chains that reduce the need for importing products.

Looking Ahead

In October 2024, Reuters reported that Honduras’ coffee exports in the 2024/25 season were up 14.5% from the previous year, an achievement that Pedro Mendoza, head of IHCAFE, attributes to the fact that “The farms are better, farmers have given them more care this year.” The increased yield and export volume could well be due to climate-resilient techniques and the development of direct market links. 

If done right, the more coffee Honduras exports, the better for the country’s efforts to eradicate poverty. However, the EU might ban sales of coffee if companies cannot prove that the product hasn’t come from a deforested area. As Europe accounts for 55% of Honduras’ coffee exports, ensuring sustainable practices will be essential for maintaining and improving upon the successes already achieved by innovations in poverty eradication in Honduras.

– Oliver Tanner

Oliver is based in London, UK and focuses on Technology and Politics for The Borgen Project.

Photo: Flickr