RAPA Work team
RAPA arises from the tangible need to access quality food, at a real cost to our community. It is at the base of the need that the lack of ancestral agricultural bases is discovered within our food suppliers: our farmers. Based on our social, economic and political relationship with the USA, we are limited in our ancestral knowledge of our farmers.
Susimar González Martinez
Project Manager
- Owner and Designer of Herboestetica, organic natural products for skin care.
- Curriculum and workshop design in medicinal plants native to Puerto Rico.
- Academic Skills: Analytical Chemistry, MS
- Agricultural Knowledge: acquired from her maternal grandfather Fabián Martínez (born in 1896).
- Owner of a 2-cuerda farm where ancestral agriculture is practiced, working with multiple crops including medicinal and native plants using lunar cycles.
Julie Quiroz
Project advisor
- Strategist focused on the power of narrative and culture.
- Leader in New Moon Collaborations, with 3 decades of experience generating creative collaborations.
- Serves the Full Spectrum Labs Organizing & Learning Team, where she focuses on storytelling to expand knowledge of capital spectrum to help community growth.
- In 2020, Julie helped create Birth Center Equity.
- Julie is a single mother, storyteller, poet, dancer, tai chi practitioner, and new moon practitioner. She is the daughter of an Ecuadorian immigrant and a Midwestern USA agricultural worker mother.
Juan M. Sanchez
Agricultural Advisor
- Bonafide farmer for over 25 years in the Lares, PR area. Cultivates coffee, citrus, and bananas.
- Farm administrator in Lares and surrounding areas.
- Uses ancestral techniques of shade-grown coffee with mixed crops.
- Community leader in charge of the water supply that connects 12 families in his community.
- Passionate about agriculture, an inheritance from his paternal grandfather, who dedicated his entire life to it.
David Quispitupa Yupa
Scientific Advisor
- Professor of Applied Physics for over 20 years at various universities in Puerto Rico.
- Master's degree in Physics from UPR - Mayaguez Campus.
- High interest in agrometeorology with the aim of improving agricultural yields and data acquisition to learn from local agricultural patterns.
- Educationally trained, integrates ideas, techniques, and science to develop knowledge in a creative and fun way.
- Passionate about agricultural science, integrating solutions for the agricultural challenges of the future.
Carlos A. Cabán Rodríguez
Legal Counsel
- Lawyer in the municipality of Aguadilla and resident of Moca. For the past 15 years, he has practiced notarial law, working daily on cases involving inheritances, trusts, and the buying and selling of land in PR.
- Committed to his people of Moca, practicing and promoting the folkloric culture of his municipality, participating in traditional Christmas parrandas in the neighborhoods of Moca.
- Direct contact between land sellers and potential candidates for the purchase and development of agricultural land.
Adela Nieves Martínez
Community Relations Officer
- Community Health Practitioner.
- Focused on assisting people in their processes by sharing her own story.
- Collaborates with individuals, groups, and social justice organizations to create practical, informative communities and spaces, mobile clinics, and collectives.
- Passionate about supporting healthcare structures, food access and sustainability, and sharing resources.