WHAT WE DO

Spicy Farmers is a social enterprise aiming to empower communities and preserve wildlife in Liwonde National Park, through the production and sale of high-quality bird's eye chillies. These communities are situated in one of the most remote areas of Malawi with limited access to employment opportunities and severe conflicts with elephants causing crop damages. Spicy Farmers is founded to train smallholder farmers in these communities, guarantee markets, and provide the inputs and resources required to grow chillies as a source of income, and to remove the incentive for elephants to break out of the National Park (they appear to dislike chillies). This will empower people in the communities to build an economic foundation to improve their lives, while also ensuring preservation of Liwonde National Park for future generations.

We monitor the farms to ensure chilli fields are large enough to form a natural border, preventing elephants from entering the fields.

WHERE WE OPERATE

We have targeted ten communities around Liwonde National Park in Malawi. Liwonde National Park faces growing threats from human population pressures, manifested in increased human-elephant conflicts. Our targeted communities are situated in four so-called 'hotspots', known for having the highest human-elephant conflicts with significant crop damage. This year we have started by farming bird's eye chillies on 30 hectares of - soon to be - irrigated land in one of the four hotspots. Of course, we would like to expand fast and also start supporting the communities in the remaining three hotspots. However, for now it is important we give all our love and attention to the first 30 hectares to ensure we do our work properly. These farmers deserve a dedicated team that actually improves their lives instead of making it worse. We therefore aim to build this company step-by-step, expanding to 100 hectares of bird's eye chilli farms, divided over all four hotspots, in the coming ten years.