lo tuyo e.V.

About us

lo tuyo e.V.'s philosophy is to support environmental education and to stimulate sustainable land use in Panama. It is registered as a non-profit organization in Munich, Germany.
Our goal is, together with like-minded people, to strengthen the consciousness of a healthy and diverse diet in Panama, the basis of which should be harvested in an ecologically sound way. For this we want to (re)awaken the appreciation of native fruits, roots and vegetables. Along with this, the knowledge of traditional land use in Panama will be collected, complemented with new scientific findings and thus prepared to be shared with farmers and other interested people.

The situation:
Of the about 75,000 edible plants worldwide, half of the overall consumption of food products consists of only 3 species. In Panama two of them are rice and corn. Rice, introduced to Central America only 200 years ago has become, with or without chicken, the staple food of the country. The result is deficiency syndromes and even deformities in children. In addition, the massive use of pesticides jeopardizes the health of the people. No other arable crop uses as many resources as rice in monoculture. In the supermarkets of the city imported goods dominate the supply. The urban society barely knows native fruit and vegetable species, while fast food wins more and more recognition.

Our vision is to
- increase the diversity of food habits – away from imported species, towards a varied diet from the local spectrum
- strengthen the security of food against climate change - this can only be done with bio diverse agricultural systems
- speed up the valuation of local usable plants - and thus assure their preservation

Therefore we are working on
- the installation of an educational garden open to visitors of all ages with an eco center and a plant ark
- the operation of the eco center as a site for environmental education and advanced training, in which seminars are offered about healthy diets, conservation of species, and the dangers of pesticides, among others
- the collection, amplification and distribution of knowledge about traditional fruits, their use and cultivation, through our market of knowledge
- the rediscovery of native or traditional useful plants and their dispersal through the plant ark
- the encouragement of sustainable production systems with high biodiversity
- the creation of prospects to prevent the sellout of rural Panama and the population's migration to the slums of the cities

We want to save lo tuyo - yours - for us and our future generations.