Quest for Gold: Dr. Daugherty's Journey Beyond Organic

This travelogue comes from Dr. Christopher Daugherty, founder of Essential Living Foods (one of our favorite companies). Here, he shares another journey in his quest for Beyond Organic foods: crops grown sustainably and handled with the utmost care to create the highest quality foods on Earth. His quest takes him all around the world, from China to Peru, and beyond...

This fall I traveled to Colombia to check on our Macadamia and Goldenberry partners and to scout out new farms to help increase our supplies while extending our philanthropic reach into new communities.
This was an amazing, inspiring journey, despite the ongoing civil war. Rather than a country in chaos, I saw a string of vibrant communities filled with dedicated, heart-centered people working in harmony with the land to create some of the most exquisite, nutritious foods available in the world.

Not only that, Essential Living Foods is helping these communities to become self-sustaining, with programs to implement permacultural farming and to gift them with new green technologies.

DAY 1
Imagine, if you would, driving in a Bullet Proof Suburban to a remote facility in the middle of endless sugar cane fields. This was my first day in Cali, Colombia, driving to meet a prospective partner: the largest Macadamia grower in the country.

The growing and shelling facility was beautiful, and something of a miracle: this is the only place on the planet where Macadamia Integrifolia produces nuts year round—all without any spraying. Their Organic certification is coming very soon.

We also toured their new Kosher and HACCP approved facility where they will be producing 2 tons a day of sulfur-free dried fruits and fruit powders.

We discussed many of Colombia’s problems: everything from the intractable civil war to the coca trade to the pressure put on indigenous communities by rainforest destruction.

We both saw that the only solution to these huge problems was a local one—the economy needs to be transformed by starting nutrient-dense sustainable farms that have a positive environmental impact. Gaviotas is the obvious inspiration here. (If you haven’t heard, Gaviotas is the most incredible example of sustainable community on the planet! 200 miles from Bogota, in the midst of an inhospitable plane, this community thrives without petrolium, and the millions of trees they’ve planted are causing the rebirth of the rainforest!)

We discussed diversifying their cash crops to include borojo, araca, mangosteen, mani, yacon, coffee, and stevia, to name a few. Then we made plans to partner with an NGO and the local university to create a demonstration garden which will teach the local community the incredible potential of Permaculture, a.k.a. “Forest Gardening” or “Intercropping.”

Simply by combining a 9 month crop with a crop of 10 year trees, these folks will be able to create immediate income while creating a holistic community garden which will provide all their medicine and food for years to come! Compared to “traditional” mono-cropping, this is the obvious winner!

From Cali we flew out to Bogota on a private jumper plane with parachutes—I checked every chute, of course!

In Bogota, we visited Customs to examine some containers of yummy Goldenberries which were about to be shipped out to ELF. Everything looked ship-shape and ready for delivery to all the appreciative people back home.

We hit the road and stopped at a local market an hour outside of Bogota, where we enjoyed some Pan de Yucca and Papayas. Refreshed by the food and contact with the local people, we carried on to the location of our present Goldenberry supplier.

This plant was CLASS A: friendly people interested in making a change, and they are ready to increase our Goldenberry supply to 40 TONS a year. We will definitely be collaborating with them more on future growing projects.

I was totally impressed by all the manual labor which goes into each and every Goldenberry. I appreciate all the love in the hands that feed us!

I was also interested to discover how fearful these growers are about losing their Organic crops. It’s strange how brainwashed we are by the chemical agriculture establishment, and I reassured them that Organic, and especially Permacultural, techniques are extremely reliable.

After this meeting, we traveled to the house of our driver, Romero, so I could test his wife for anemia and give her a naturopathic treatment. I gave her some dietary recommendations, and she was very pleased and looking forward to improving her health.

Afterwards, we enjoyed some ceviche and went to my favorite place: the health food store. Lo and behold, a really nice Ecologica/Organica dept. I grabbed several fruits which I had never seen before (that means a lot, coming from me!).

Romero kindly identified them as Curuba, Lulo, Mamoncillo, Caimo Morado, Feijo. They were yummy, very acidic, and extremely cleansing. Who knows? Some of them may become ELF products in the future. It’s really up to the plants themselves—like the spirit of a child, the spirit of a plant has a direction in life, and we can only serve as stewards.

DAY 2
The next morning, at 5 a.m., I rose early to meet our motley crew: a food scientist, an exporter, an agronomists and a body guard. We drove three hours to the growing regions southeast of the Bogota Mountains. We went up to around 6000 ft and explored a few remote Goldenberry farms that grow for our supplier.

I was very impressed with the health of the land and the scientific knowledge of even the most remote indigenous farmers. It once again shows that text book knowledge is inherent to survival.

We ventured through the fields and even strapped on a picking bucket in order to see how long it takes to pick 2 kilos of fresh Goldenberry. A very serene experience in the mountains: sunny Andes to the left and cloud-covered Andes to the right, with lots of beautiful insects and weeds and signs of great agricultural practices that nurture the environment and the communities surrounding this farm.

One farmer, Balconias, was just amazing. I love it when the farmers you visit simply know you are one of them, and it doesn’t matter what language you speak: you connect on a much deeper level, the level of the earth. Balconias showed me the chemicals he used to use and the Organic methods he has found to replace them.

After talking and picking and consuming my fair share of Goldenberry, we headed back to the north of Bogota to visit another Organic Euregap farm. Yet again I met another brother farmer: Jose Miguel, a man after my own heart.

It really hit home to enter his farm and to feel that familiar vibe: Organic farming, Right Livelihood, Fresh ALIVE foods, and lots of healthy looking people. He even had a Summer Farming Camp for kids! We saw 30 different colors of lettuces, onions, leeks, brassicas, ground cover and herbs. In the distance were his Goldenberries.

I was so overwhelmed by the wholesome vibe here that I actually took a moment to myself to breathe 30 times and feel gratitude for coming “home.”

When we reached the Goldenberries, the Agronomist smiled at me and said to try one. I smiled back and dived in. It was unbelievable! As if someone put a sugar cube in my mouth! So sweet and tangy!

I asked Jose if I could dig a little bit. Proud, he said to go right ahead. I unearthed such a vibrant mixture of earthworms and rich, fluffy soil! I proceeded into his veggie garden to nibble on parsley, pigweed, crotalaria, lambs quarters, celery, bok choi, and lettuces. Such incredibly tasty, nutritious greens. And then, of course, dessert was more Goldenberries.

Relaxing on his land, Jose and I discussed everything from right livelihood to the secret life of plants and soil. He told me about his trials in life—he was an executive in Coca Cola for 20 years and had burned out on it. He decided to heal himself and his relationship with his family and now is a full time farmer. Isn’t it funny how you always end up back at the place you call home in your soul: PEACE.

Feeling blessed to have met each other, I left his farm and proceeded to the sorting house of sorting houses: more Goldenberries than you could ever imagine. We proceeded to watch the selection process and tour of the plant.

On the way home, I noticed a Cacao plantation, and of course I had to stop and have a bite to eat. I took the biggest Yellow Cacao Pod I have ever seen!

After this we proceeded to meet with one more processor of Goldenberry. Lets just say I ate my fair share of Goldenberries.

ELF is now aligned with several new processors and 100 new farmers. We have lots of work to do to develop them, but it will all pay off in the long run, with abundant healthy food and increasingly healthy sustainable communities.

Day 3
The next morning we drove to visit ELF’s new exclusive partner. Located in an incredible region for farming, itt’s one of the most bio-diverse parts of the country, and there are absolutely no molds, aggressive insects, or fungi.

The only thing lacking is Water. They are located in the “desert of Colombia.”

Not a problem for them. They have invested in reservoirs so huge that they make the ones on our Peruvian farm look like bath tubs. Imagine a body of water 10 stories deep and over 70 yards long!

This group was started in order to provide the community an alternative to chemical agriculture while still making a living through export markets. They have already planted 16,000 Goldenberry plants which will start yielding in October. They plan to plant another 30,000 plants. When all of this is planted, it’s 50 TONS per month! Pretty righteous.

But beyond the commercial side of things, they are deeply commited to sustainability and long-term thinking. They have a demonstration garden of 6 hectares for children to better understand the fundamentals of permaculture, and there are many other plans in the works. They’re a pretty cool group of people, fairly Buddhist, and they even have a photo of the Dalai Lama at their Farm.

After reviewing the farm, I gladly gave my advice on what they need to do to be more sustainable and what issues they may have along the way. Thankfully they were very receptive. They will be on track and this year will be supplying ELF with the first Certified Organic Goldenberries in the world.

Ultimately, this journey was an eye-opener. Despite its problems, Colombia is such a rich and beautiful land, with so much potential waiting to be discovered. I think ELF and other like-minded groups can have a tremendous impact on the peace and health of this land and its people.

In the mean time, I will be continuing my travels, searching for the most delicious, nutritious, sustainably created products I can find.

Until next time!
Dr. Daymaker