Zelada is to receive the “Soul of Rurality” award, part of an initiative by the specialized agency for agriculture and rural development intended to shine the spotlight on men and women who leave their mark and make a difference in the rural areas of the Americas, a key element in the world’s food and nutrition security and environmental sustainability.
Ir Arriba
Leaders Of Rurality
The IICA will recognize rural leaders in the Americas, under an initiative to pay tribute to men and women who are leaving their mark and making a difference in rural communities of our hemisphere.
This award pays tribute to those who are playing a unique dual role: guaranteeing food and nutritional security, by producing under all circumstances, as well as protecting the biodiversity of the planet. It will also emphasize their capacity to be positive role models in rural areas of the region.
IICA recognizes Salomón Zelada, a groundbreaking leader of the agricultural cooperative movement in El Salvador for more than three decades, as a Leader of Rurality in the Americas
Costa Rican high school students, creators of a module for the promotion and dissemination of silvopastoral goat farming, recognized by IICA as Leaders of Rurality of the Americas
This initiative promotes agricultural education and training among young people and producers in Santa Cruz, Guanacaste, selling goat milk-based products in their communities.
Odette Varela, General Director of the National School of Agriculture, is recognized by IICA as a Leader of Rurality of the Americas for her work to strengthen smallholders in El Salvador
The Leaders of Rurality award is a recognition for those who fulfill an irreplaceable double role: being guarantors of food and nutritional security and at the same time guardians of the planet's biodiversity through production in any circumstance.
Indigenous Amazonian collector and entrepreneur Katia Silene Tonkyre, the first woman cacique of her village, will receive IICA’s “Soul of Rurality” award, which recognizes Leaders of Rurality of the Americas
The award is part of an initiative of the agency specializing in agricultural and rural development to recognize men and women who are leaving a mark and making a difference in rural areas of the Americas.
Andrea Ballestero, a Uruguayan artisanal fisherwoman who has blazed a trail in this traditionally male occupation, has been named an IICA Leader of Rurality of the Americas
The Leaders of Rurality of the Americas award pays tribute to those who are playing a unique dual role, both as guarantors of food and nutritional security, as well as custodians of the planet’s biodiversity, by producing under all manner of circumstances.
Yessica Yana, an indigenous woman who operates a drone that makes agriculture in the Bolivian Altiplano more efficient, named a “Leader of Rurality” by IICA
Yana grew up in Villa Puni, a small community in the department of La Paz, on the shores of Lake Titicaca and more than 3800 meters above sea level. Most of the people who live there engage in fishing and the production of crops such as potatoes, quinoa, broad beans and barley, despite having to contend with the poor quality of soils in the area.