Agricultural Development and Environmental Protection in Transylvania.
Fundația ADEPT, founded in 2004, is a biodiversity conservation and rural development NGO based in Saschiz, Romania.
+40 (0) 265 711 635
Email: office@fundatia-adept.org
Fundatia ADEPT Transilvania
Str. Principală, 166, Saschiz, Mureș, 547510, România
In an unspoilt valley near Sighisoara, we are developing a model farm where to show how innovation and new markets can support traditional communities and land management; for the benefit of farmland biodiversity, sustainable farming, and small-scale farmer incomes.
Funded by: Flora & Flora International and Grass Valley Trust and Rainforest Concern
Project Duration: 2016 - continuous
Fauna and Flora International (FFI) and Grass Valley Trust have generously funded Fundația ADEPT to buy 200ha of HNV grassland in the valley of Angofa (location of an abandoned village), near Sighișoara, plus the associated farmhouse and schoolhouse. Loans and donations from Friends of ADEPT in London have enabled is to buy and breeding herd of 65 pedigree Aberdeen Angus livestock.
ADEPT plans to use the Angofa valley to demonstrate concrete actions for habitat restoration and protection, for protection of biodiversity, under management which is suited to small-scale High Nature Value farming. This demonstration farm will show how to maintain landscape features, threatened habitats especially wildflower-rich haymeadows, and at the same time bring better incomes to small-scale farmers, encouraging them to continue traditional farming.
We will carry out mutually beneficial cooperative management with 10-15 neighbouring farmers on 500ha. We will train 90 farmers per year in nature-friendly management, and in marketing linked to nature value. More widely, the ideas demonstrated at Angofa will be replicated in other villages helping dozens of villages and thousands of farmers have netter incomes, while protecting biodiversity at the same time.
We have bought the farmhouse and 200 ha of surrounding farmland, and stocked the land with a valuable breeding herd. We have brought the other 15 land owners in the valley together for the first time to cooperate in the management of the valley.
The grassland management established at Angofa farm since 2016 has resulted in the restoration of many hectares of wildflower-rich haymeadows, and has already measurably increased grassland floristic diversity. This has been summarised in a report by botanist John Akeroyd and project manager Nat Page, published in FFI’s journal Oryx in 2020.
