Our Work
Who We Are
Guatemala
Vía 4, 01-00, Zona 4
Edificio Campus Tecnológico
Torre 2, Oficina 1102
Guatemala, Guatemala 01004
USA
Semilla Nueva
P.O. BOX 8643
Boise, ID 83707
Blog
How do we scale our impact to reach 100,000 families in Guatemala—and begin to reduce nutritional deficiencies for the entire country?
Answer: We need to develop even higher yielding seeds with the same great levels of nutrition as our current F3! This is how we can provide farmers with what’s most important to them: enough food to feed their families and enough income to put their children through school. How do we develop new seeds? Semilla…
Meet Nelson, Semilla Nueva’s field technician in Petén.
Nelson, like many farmers in Guatemala, has been growing corn since before he can remember. He now applies over 20 years of experience in the fields to helping other farmers grow Semilla Nueva’s more nutritious corn. Nelson has been a valued member of our team since the launch of the F3 Fortaleza seed in 2017,…
Maynor’s Story: The opportunity that gave him the means to stay in his community, Quiché.
Maynor’s family owns a single acre of farmland in the community of Palquí in Uspantán, Quiché. In years past, his father, José, used this land to raise chickens, goats, and pigs, and grow corn, tomatoes, and fruit—but mostly green beans. Still, a third of this acre of farmland was reserved for growing corn, yielding 500…
Why do we need representative samples?
Answer: For the first two and a half years of commercial sales, Semilla Nueva’s biggest limitation in impact evaluation was that we lacked a representative list of farmers to study. The farmers we surveyed were either known personally by our field technicians or had participated in promotional events, creating a biased sample. We need representative…
Why Corn?
If the majority of Guatemala’s corn farmers live in poverty, why do hundreds of thousands of Guatemalan farmers keep growing corn? If corn lacks key nutrients, why do millions of Guatemalans continue to eat it? In Guatemala, the Mayan creation story teaches that the first grandparents were made from corn. The Popol Vuh, the sacred book of…
Meet Dr. Fredy Longo, Semilla Nueva’s first Ph.D. plant breeder and leader of our research and development team.
Fredy left his previous job at Duwest to join the Semilla Nueva team for one major reason: “[Semilla Nueva] said, ‘We are going to sell seed’ and I said, ‘Done!’ This is the best option to make this sustainable. It is not an NGO that comes, gives [things] away to everyone, and when two years…
Meet Our Farmers: Mr. Daniel Leal Xe
This year, Semilla Nueva will help nearly 18,000 farming families improve their livelihoods with better corn. During our most recent field visit, Daniel and his family generously shared a glimpse of what life is like for one of these farmers. Semilla Nueva Farmer, Daniel Leal Xe (39) and his family, wife Vilma (29) and daughters,…
Last Field Day of the season !
Tip your sombreros to our field team! Semilla Nueva has just ended another successful field day season with one last event in the sunny town of Cuilapa, Santa Rosa, a two-hour drive away from the capital. Every year between February and May, at the height of the dry season, and just before farmers choose the …
Unlocking the Potential of Biofortified Maize
As a relatively small nonprofit, Semilla Nueva may seem an unlikely player in the world of advanced crop breeding. Dr. Enrique Kreff, Semilla Nueva’s Director of Research and Development, explains, “We do it because nobody else has developed biofortified maize seeds that can truly compete in the market. We specialize in breeding nutritious, biofortified maize…
Producing Seeds of Change
In 2018, just over 4,000 small-scale farmers planted Semilla Nueva’s biofortified seeds. This number tripled to over 12,000 farmers in 2021, and this year, over 20,000 farmers will plant our biofortified seeds, improving the nutrition of nearly 600,000 maize consumers. By 2026, 40,000 farmers will plant our seeds, feeding 1M consumers. Our long-term goal (2036)…
