Welcome To LionHeart AgroTech
More with Less.
One of the great challenges of our time is to grow calories to a growing and more discerning global population.
This agricultural output must be produced on existing under utilized or less productive arable land; we can no longer sustainably encroach on the remaining undeveloped land. It must also use water and fertilizers more efficiently, as we are facing shortages everywhere in the world. Improvements in calorific yield per hectare, per unit of water, and per unit of fertilizer are thus essential.
Lionheart Agrotech has identified hybrid coconut as the best crop given these constraints. Compared to sugar cane which is often considered the gold standard in photosynthesis-to-calories machines, we can produce and harvest the same amount of calories using one quarter of the land, and one tenth of the water and fertilizer.
In addition, hybrid coconut is a labor intensive crop that grows best in a belt of plus/minus 20 degrees around the equator. That means growing hybrid coconuts (non GMA – natural breeding) is also an effective remedy for poverty as well as reducing the rural to urban population drift. Lionheart’s model provides for ten times more jobs per hectare than for example oil palm.
Furthermore, we always recognize that we are guests on the lands, and we make a concerted effort to build ties with the local communities, not just by creating jobs, but also by boosting opportunities for entrepreneurship by being a sub-contractor for Lionheart (bee-keeping which yields both pollination benefits and honey, or generation of organic fertilizer, or provision of transport services), by improving the health and nutrition situation (micro aquaponics systems), by offering training in sustainable renewable energy solutions (biogas, micro solar, micro hydro) and much more.
Finally, with sound organic agronomic practices using no chemical spraying, no industrial pesticides, insecticides, fungicides or other, no cutting of trees over 20 cm circumference or any hardwood or protected trees, no planting on slopes over 18 degrees, with leguminous cover crops replacing the need for chemical fertilizer, with gravity fed irrigation, with bio-diversity friendly green islands and green corridors, Lionheart achieves this with the lightest environmental footprint possible, in fact by complimenting and supporting nature.
In summary, we believe that our hybrid coconut farming model provides the best balance between (a) land, water and fertilizer efficiency, (b) poverty relief, and (c) environmental impact.
Follow our Philippine operation here.