The Cooperativa Agraria Norandino asked ECOTOP to accompany its members in converting young cocoa plantations into dynamic agroforestry systems. In December 2025 ECOTOP installed two pilot plots with member producers in the Amazonas region and trained the cooperative’s technicians and producers, so that the system can be expanded on at least eight further plots.
The collaboration runs on a mission basis: short, intensive field assignments that leave the cooperative’s own team able to design, install and manage the plots.
The pilot plots are two-year-old CCN-51 cocoa plantations in monoculture on former pasture, with clayey soils poor in organic matter. Before planting, the team observed secondary succession in the field with the producers and technicians, the basis of the dynamic agroforestry approach, and translated it into a spatial design adapted to the cocoa spacing of 4 × 4 m and 3 × 3 m.
The objective is a diversified, resilient system that progressively improves soil structure and fertility and gives the family additional harvests, and a trained team at Norandino that carries the approach to the next plots.
• Field sessions on secondary succession and its application to agriculture
• Design of fruit, timber and short-cycle crop arrangements adapted to each plot
• Successional nuclei prepared and planted with plantain corms, aguaje seedlings and other species
• Descriptions of the initial state, the work done and management recommendations for each plot, as the basis for continued technical follow-up
Cooperativa Agraria Norandino – cooperative of organic cocoa and coffee producers in northern Peru, whose members in the Amazonas region host the pilot plots.
