Locally adapted varieties in Sierra de los Cuchumatanes, Guatemala

This good practice started in 1999 in the Sierra de los Cuchumatanes, Huehuetenango, Guatemala, with active participation of the Asociación de Organizaciones de los Cuchumatanes (ASOCUCH), technical support by Fundación para la Innovación Tecnológica (FUNDIT) and Instituto de Ciencia y Tecnología Agrícola (ICTA) and financial support by the Norwegian Development Fund (Utviklingsfondet). The main objective was to improve the livelihoods of small-scale farmer families and indigenous communities through the sustainable use of native agrobiodiversity, including for adaptation to climate change. The core components of the initiative include: (1) participatory characterization of local varieties of maize, beans, vegetables and native herbs with the participation of farmers organized in Community Seed Banks and/or Local Agricultural Research Committees (CIALs); (2) Participatory Plant Breeding (PPB) of maize varieties adapted to specific conditions; and (3) improvement of local varieties, mainly maize, through the use of the Stratified Mass Selection method. The main results obtained include the generation of 10 improved varieties of maize; the dissemination of more than 3,000 seed packages