Consultant and Educator of Agriculture Hello Bahamas Readers, I am always interested in teaching and consulting in the tropics in winter. I have my own farm in Maine. Our primary cash crop is greenhouse plants, medicinal plants for the northeast and seed grade garlic I work for a number of local and government agencies, NGO's and independent farmers of all kinds as a soil and crop advisor. My particular interest is biological / nutritional agriculture, It combines the best practices of organic, conventional, permaculture, and SRI - (System of Rice Intensification and its applications to other crops). I serve a growing number of large and small farms in the US and abroad. The operations are as diverse as fruits, row crop vegetables, grains of all kinds, and livestock of many species. I enjoy field research and exploring viability and new methods of raising crops. I practice agricultural trouble shooting with plant nutrition and soil biology as remedy rather than chemical protection to address the real causes of plant and animal distress. I often team up with other environmental companies like example; Biomatrix Water of Scotland or an organic agency, school ag-programs or food projects. I love to teach, especially enjoy teaching children who will be the next generation that feeds us all in our near future. What they learn about soil and crops now, will influence everything in the future of food. Seminars for schools, agricultural groups, field training classes are a specialty as well. I encourage my clients and students to think outside the box to over come the current paradigms of food production and help repair the socio-economic link between healthy soils, and human communities. From a historical perspective, a nation or region's functioning topsoil is its original wealth. To build soil is to build real economies. Sustained farm profitability is directly related to sustainable soil health. Current projects : Designing and implementing a 10, 000 hen free range egg farm in Guangdong Province - southern China. Privately granted consulting project through Heart of Maine RC&D, to re-initiate Maine's grain independence. Especially wheat. Contributing researcher and writer to the SRI / SWI movement at home and especially abroad. Traveling presentations on the principals of biological agriculture. Formulating dry and liquid soil amendment blends, customized to a particular field, farm, region or crop. Regions of interest, Latin America, Philippines, Bahamas, Caribbean. Bahamas is preferred due to the fact that it imports as much as 80% of it's food supplies and has limited fresh water resources. Food and water independence for Island nations is a major issue. If world economies are further compromised by loses in the capitalistic sector, then every nation, city and town village and family must still feed itself. Many of these skills are lost world wide and need rekindling. That is where I do my most humanitarian work. It's fun and can be profitable. Question of the day, Who grows rice in the Bahamas? Mark Fulford | 
