Rurbans - School of Shepherds

2009 - 2022:

• 14 classes have completed courses at the School,
• 234 people have been trained to become livestock organic farmers,
• 599 applications to enter the school have been received,
• 154 livestock farmers have participated as tutors
• 64% of those trained go on to become established as organic farmers or shepherds and a further 7% become involved in the primary sector.
• The training course is recognised by the Catalan Department of Agriculture and gives qualified students eligibility for EU young farmers’ subsidies.
• The school offers a comprehensive advisory service to former students with the aim of consolidating their projects.

Rurbans association was born in 2003 and since 2009, it runs the School of Shepherds of Catalonia, that trains future shepherds and farmers.

Rurbans’ main mission is to guarantee the generational succession of extensive livestock farming through the incorporation of new agents in the primary sector with an agroecological approach.

Most of our students are newcomers to agriculture and breeding. They are not direct descendants of peasant farmers and do not have land to start their own projects. This group faces many obstacles, which hamper their ability to start their projects. These include the high levels of competition among farmers, with retailers driving out those who are less competitive, and speculative investment in land which drives up prices. At the same time, they have the desire and ability to recapture the spirit of peasant agriculture and use if to inform new ways of managing agriculture and cattle.

We want extensive, sustainable, profitable livestock farming recognized by society as a whole. We want our farmers to make a dignified living as an innovative farmer, who can live with dignity and happiness by selling a quality product that is responsible for the environment. We want a new generation of farmers to promote a change in the current paradigm of the sector, basing their activity on an agroecological model.

Rurbans is a non-profit association. We chose the status of NGO because of its flexibility: we can develop our own projects and manage vocational training schemes which are not directly linked to the public sector while still having access to public funds.

Our main activities are:

1. Training people in the field of extensive livestock farming with an agroecological approach. The course given at the School of Shepherds of Catalonia consists of 10 weeks of theory and 4 months of practical work on livestock farms and mountains spread throughout the territory.
2. Advanced training: we provide our students with an incubator extensive livestock farm to test their project before starting it. We aim to offer a one-week course on extensive livestock breeding for fire prevention and landscape management. For the moment being, this course is part of the formal training of the School of Shepherds but it is meant to be open for people who is already working as shepherds and want to broaden their knowledge.
3. Services to the administration: we offer support and advice for those local administrations that own forests and are interested in the use of herds to reduce fire risk.
4. Giving advice in the process of project creation and settlement. For those people who are in the process of starting a small project of livestock breeding, the School of Shepherds offers technical advice to accompany them in matters related to necessary documentation, procedures, management of the farm, purchase of livestock, etc.
5. Promoting farm transmission. It is essential to guarantee that farmers who are close to retirement can find people to take over their farm. We run a programme that includes raising awareness among farmers closed to retirement, a training offered to retiring farmers to learn about different options and challenges of farm transmission, a mentoring programme and sessions to put in contact retiring farmers and newcomers.
6. Providing a job/land/project exchange platform. We receive job offers and facilitate the first professional steps of former students of the School by putting them in contact with farmers seeking replacement or permanent workers. We disseminate offers/demands of land and projects among former students so that they can more easily find a place to start their project or find project partners.

• Training a new generation of shepherds and breeders
  The school has been running for 14 years (2009 –2022). Former students are still kept in touch with and supported by an ongoing evaluation. Between 2009 and today, the School has received 599 applications from potential students. Out of these, 234 students have been selected and gone through the School’s training, which is officially recognised by the Catalan Department of Climatic Action, Food and Rural Agenda (the former Department of Agriculture), the Agricultural College and the Associació Rurbans.
  
  Since the school began in 2009, 154 professional farmers from all over the region have participated as tutors. In summer, we also work on mountain pastures in different parts of Catalonia and France. We promote peasant and organic cattle management models.
  At the end of our thirteen-school year, a total of 187 students had completed the training. 119 (64%) are now directly working in breeding or agriculture: some have their own farm (most of them in a precarious situation with regard to land access) while others are waged workers on other farms, including those who work as mountain shepherds in the highlands in summer and waged workers in winter.

• Access to land activities
  Our access to land project has gone through several stages. From 2009 to 2012, we sought out and received offers to buy, lease or sell land. We have also been acting as intermediaries to facilitate contacts between owners and futures farmers.
  
  In 2012 and 2013, l’Associació Rurbans, together with eight other organisations and experts, began promoting the creation of Terra Franca to promote access to land for agroecological projects, in line with the philosophy of Terre de Liens. Terra Franca was established as an association in 2013, developing a dynamic for access to land at the regional level that goes beyond our own activities as an association and school.
  At the moment being, the School receives offers of land and projects that seek partners and it disseminates them among the former students.

– Vídeo
– Article in the New York Times, August 2015
– Article in El Pais, Sept 2015