What and who is La Tierra Verde

My name is Jantien Henriet and I set up La Tierra Verde Hortalizas Ecologicas in March 2012.  La Tierra Verde grows vegetables and herbs in an ecological way. We have a high regard of the natural environment and our goal is to produce without harming flora or fauna. The gardens of La Tierra Verde are established in old olive groves around Alcuéscar in the province of Cáceres.





Currently there are two gardens in use. The first and longest in production is a borrowed garden in Martin Laguna. A very nice couple from Alcuéscar let us use the open spaces between the olive trees to grow vegetables. The area under vegetables measures approx. 1500m². For a serious market garden, this area is too small. Another olive grove in Malvecino was bought in July. This second terrain  measures 7500m² and about 2/3 of this will be eventually under vegetables, herbs, forest fruits and fruit trees.

The terrain Malvecino was abandoned for many years and very much overgrown with brambles. In October the brambles were removed with the help of an excavator. After that the land was ploughed. Step by step the garden begins to look like a market garden.

We sell fresh vegetables and herbs on a weekly basis to a number of households in the area of Alcuéscar and Montánchez. Since the garden in Malvecino is still in the early stages of production, the vegetables are coming from the garden in Martin Laguna. As it is still winter we have a number of winter vegetables.

At this moment La Tierra Verde has no ecological certification, but  is working to get it. However, it takes at least 3 years to get certified, due to the monitoring process of the CAEX (Comité de Agricultura Ecológica de Extremadura). We guarantee that we are not using any chemical fertilizers, insecticides, herbicides or fungicides on our crops other than are allowed under the rules and regulations of the European Commission.