Published: November 27, 2023

At the beginning of 2023 a Community of Practice (CoP) was created by HORIZONT3000 with the objective to exchange relevant experiences and gain new knowledge about Agro-forestry Systems in Mozambique between various partner organizations. The Coffee project of the Gorongosa National Park is seen as a successful agroforestry example in Mozambique. Of course, the members of the CoP were keen to get to know this project!

Who organized the event and who participated?

Lais Nara and Mareen Zeitelhofer, Technical Advisors of HORIZONT3000 in Mozambique, organized the learning visit in cooperation with the Gorongosa National Park. The learning visit took place from the 18-20 of September 2023 and in total 22 CoP members from 11 different partner organizations participated in the activity. The Event was sponsored by an Austrian partner organisation of HORIZONT3000, called Missio, and the knowledge management program of HORIZONT3000, called KNOW-HOW3000.

What happened in these three days?

On the first day, the participants travelled to Gorongosa and the afternoon was used to get to know each other (first meeting of CoP in presence!) and to share the expectations of the learning visit.

On the second day, the coffee project was visited where the project manager explained, together with their technical team, how they manage their coffee plantations. In the afternoon, some members of the participating communities were available for questions and interchange experiences.

On the last day, the Gorongosa National Park invited the CoP to visit their coffee processing hall which ended with a delicious coffee tasting. Before heading back to Beira and Chimoio, a critical evaluation of the learning visit was done and the next steps within the CoP defined.

What was the outcome of the learning visit?

The three days were characterized by lively discussions and experience sharing between the CoP and Park members. Furthermore, critical analysis of the visited coffee project led to several lessons learnt, which the members took home and will implement in their own Agroforestry projects. Last, but not least, strong synergies between the participants were created, which is a base for future collaborations and activities of the CoP.