About Us > What We Do > Capacity Building

For many years, EWS has recognized that providing seeds and sharing knowledge go hand-in-hand. In most emerging markets, the relatively poor performance of smallholder farmers can be attributed to high poverty rates, lack of knowledge in using improved varieties, poor cultivation techniques, and weak value chain function.

In this environment, EWS has identified Knowledge Transfer as a necessary precondition for developing new and further strengthening emerging markets, and thus a critical part of the business model. EWS has been supporting pre-commercial, intensive farmer extension programs in Asia and Africa for more than 18 years.

These activities are intrinsically linked to EWS’ business model, based on a win-win between company and farmer. By supporting improved income with smallholder farmers, pre-competitive knowledge transfer creates an environment where the company can be more successful developing a future market.

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	Number of farmers directly reached each year			Planned direct outreach
	2015	2016	2017	2018	2019	2020
Cambodia	1, 640	2, 113	8, 258
India	N/A	789	11, 074
Indonesia	9, 023	12218	8, 383
Myanmar	5, 448	11008	13, 617
Philippines	3, 493	3, 406	14, 133
Thailand	300	800	2, 681
Tanzania	2, 436	5, 515	9, 816
Uganda			270
Total	22, 340	35, 849	68, 232	87, 350	117, 328	154, 527
Since 2015 EWS pre commercial extension has directly reached 126, 421 individual smallholder vegetable farmers (prior to 2014 records were not accurately kept)

Impact Studies

Currently the involvement of women in the company's pre-competitive extension services is approximately 30%. More recently the company is increasingly putting gender targets into specific projects; not just in participation, but also targeting women as key farmers.

Crop & Technical Guides

EWS Technical Working Group has developed a series of modules, training material and high quality planting guides. This material has been developed and tested through years of experience. EWS cooperates closely with Wageningen University to assure recommendations (especially pesticides and fertilizers) promote sustainable production practices.

Crop guides, technical guides and posters are currently available in 18 languages, covering 28 crops and 13 specific topics:

Languages

English (Asia)	Myanmar (MM)	Swahili (East Africa)
English (East Africa)	Khmer (CB)	French (West Africa)
English (West Africa)	Bahasa (INDO)	Bengali (Bangladesh)
Filipino (PH)	Marathi (IN)	Timorense (East-Timor)
Bisaya (PH)	Hindi (IN)	English (Ethiopia)
Thai (TH	Odia (IN)	Loa (Uganda)

Other languages currently in development include Spanish (Guatemala), Sinhala (Sri Lanka), Amharic (Ethiopia), Gujrathi (IN) & Kannada (IN)

Crop Guides:

Bitter gourd	Eggplant	Okra	Sponge gourd
Bottle gourd	French bean	Onion	Sweet Corn
Cabbage	Hot Pepper	Pakchoi	Sweet Pepper
Caisim	Kangkong	Papaya	Tomato
Cauliflower	Marigold	Pumpkin	Watermelon
Chinese Cabbage	Melon	Ridge gourd	Wax gourd
Cucumber	Mungbean	Snakegourd	Yardlong bean