Lighthouse Farm Lab Brazil: Managing Complexity in Diverse Landscapes

This Lab is designed for:

• Professionals across the food value chain
• Agronomists, farm managers, supply-chain advisors and sustainability leads
• Organisations working with commodity crops (soy, beef, coffee)
• Professionals seeking to rethink business models toward greater resilience

• Combine learnings from visits to highly diverse farms
• Analyse complex cropping systems and agroforestry models as resilience strategies
• Recognise trade-offs and develop mindshifts for diversifying beyond dominant cash crops
• Understand how farmers and stakeholders navigate real system change
• Identify leverage points for rethinking your own business model or value chain strategy

Across five intensive days you will:

• Visit diverse farms: large-scale soy and beef operations as well as smallholder agroforestry systems
• Engage with farmers, cooperatives and processors across the regional food network
• Analyse how landscape diversity influences productivity, soil health and market resilience
• Participate in collaborative group work on system redesign
• Explore the coffee value chain and its socio-ecological significance
• Develop actionable strategies to apply in your own professional context

Before joining the Farm Lab, you complete the online learning modules to build a shared foundation. These modules provide essential concepts, farmer insights and system-thinking tools that prepare you to fully engage in the real-world learning experience on the farm.