Aquaponics: Underprivileged Community In Cusuna, Honduras

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Recommended: Environmental benefits of aquaponics

Nature has provided everything we need for life, that is, if we preserve it. Aquaponics can meet the nutritional needs of any given family or community, while conserving our natural resources. Personally, I have had the opportunity to implement this system in an underprivileged community in Cusuna, Honduras, my own home in Florida, and have aspirations to design and develop systems specific for children’s homes in the Dominican Republic.

As a twelve-year old, I took my first mission trip to Cusuna, Honduras. Although this village lies on the coast, the area is over fished, and the soil is sandy and undernourished. The population is almost 100% Garifuna, and widely discriminated against. Consequently, there is little to no food, water, …show more content…

However, as I continued to research, I understood the true potential of this style of farming. Not only could it assist those in impoverished areas, but it could even feed my family here in Florida. After consulting an expert in the field and constructing for about a week, we finished our setup. With our hot climate, similar to Honduras, we began to realize the benefits of this system. Because the plants roots grow directly in water, time and resources are not wasted through daily watering. At first, we had slow results. However, within several months, multitudes of plants were produced, enough to feed our entire family a meal each day. Considering this was a small system, I realized the impact that a larger scale could have on impoverished areas with just the plants alone. Although our plans did not consist of eating our fish, this section of the system could add an additional and even greater source of nutrition to these impoverished areas I desire to assist.

As my missionary work progressed, I began traveling to new places. Recently, I have become incredibly attached to two children’s homes in the Dominican Republic. My hope is to implement aquaponics systems at these homes to help the care-takers feed the children. Furthermore, as I aspire to one day become an engineer, it is my desire to take these

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