In 2026 all of Central America is in the midst of a devastating drought
In the hills of northern Honduras, ACTS works with a wide spread community of subsistence farmers who depend on what they can grow to feed their families. The production of beans and corn, which are the local staples, depends entirely on accurately predicting the arrival of the annual rainy season. This year, for the second time in the last four years, there has been no rainy season. Consequently, there will be little to no beans or corn produced this year.
Community leaders in the region are telling ACTS there is a very real threat of wide spread food shortages over the next nine months. An ACTS team will be in El Rosario this November trying to assess the situation and come up with ways to help.
Funding for food purchase for families in dire straights
Technical assistance and funding for small plot farming and gardening that can be more easily irrigated than large fields.
Technical assistance and funding to help land owners develop natural water springs into reliable water sources for their own crops and for the rest of the community.
Investigation and research into alternative crops and cultivation techniques.
Since the spring of 2024, screwworms have become a constant and devastating plague on all livestock in Honduras
Screwworms are a parasitic fly larva that can infect any injured or newborn animal and can be fatal in as little as 1-3 days if not treated properly. In a region where keeping livestock healthy was already difficult, this insidious parasite has made things much harder, but Honduran farmers are resourceful and tough. They have adjusted their husbandry practices to keep their animals safe and detect new infestations earlier.
One of the biggest hurdles faced is that the medications they need to prevent and treat screwworm infestation are either not available at all or hard to get and expensive. For a condition that requires early, aggressive treatment to save the animal, this is a huge problem for poor farmers in isolated rural areas.
ACTS has helped by providing initial funding to establish a community pharmacy that makes the drugs and insecticides that farmers need, easily and quickly available to all.
This is what a bean field looks like in July, on a normal year. In 2026 with extreme drought, there was nothing growing.
Here we have cropland during a drought, only a few scrubby weeds survive.
With local leader Nelson Mejia (on left), we inspected an undeveloped “wild” spring that can conceivably be improved with catchment systems to use the water for agriculture.
Raised bed gardens are being used to try growing vegetables to enhance the traditional diet of corn and beans.
Farmers with small herds of cows are learning to do regular inspections to identify and treat any screw worm infestations immediately.