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Adam V'Adama: Growing New Farmers, Protecting Food, and Border Security
The average age of Israeli farmers is 65. Cultivating a new generation of farmers to embrace the land is critical for food security and border security.
JNF-USA affiliate, Adam V’Adama ("Man and Land"), is doing just this with its vibrant initiative enabling Israeli teenagers to balance their high school curriculum with hands-on learning about planting, harvesting, land maintenance, and more. Coming from all parts of Israel and varied socioeconomic backgrounds, students learn to love the land and feel responsible for it.
Beginning in 2015, Adam V’Adama, which is part of Hashomer HaChadash (another JNF- USA affiliate), established a network of boarding schools strategically placed on Israel’s borders. There, students absorb lessons in Zionism, leadership, and resilience, along with academics and agricultural work assisting local farmers. Many go on to serve in the IDF’s elite units.
Amit Meir, CEO of Adam V'Adama, says "This is an opportunity to experience education with meaning and strengthen the country's borders from within. Israel's food security is no less important than border and domestic security and being part of Adam V'Adama means being part of strengthening Israel's food security.”
Adam V’Adama continues to grow. A year ago, a new high school was established at Kibbutz Yir'on in the Upper Galilee. Another is planned at Kibbutz Matzuba, near the Lebanon border. In the words of Moshe Davidovich, a local Regional Council head, this will be “a strategic anchor that preserves our civilian presence on the front line."
With JNF-USA’s support, Adam V’Adama is strengthening Israel in so many ways: protecting Israel’s food security and civilian border security, fostering social cohesion, and cultivating new generations of strong, dedicated and resilient Israelis.
ADI Negev: Repairing One Body at a Time
Dvorah Richman, the writer of this story, shares her connection to ADI Negev-Nahalat Eran and an important update about this JNF-USA affiliate.
I visited ADI–Negev-Nahalat Eran (ADI Negev) in 2019 as part of a JNF-USA Disabilities Mission and, again, in 2024 with JNF-USA. Its people, mission, and beautiful rehabilitation campus are near and dear to my heart. ADI Negev cares for and empowers more than 300 residents and special education students with severe disabilities.
Last November, Israel’s first School of Prosthetics and Orthotics opened on JNF-USA affiliate’s ADI Negev rehabilitation campus in the South.
More than 20,000 people in Israel now require prostheses for limb replacement. Many are war-wounded young people with long, productive lives ahead of them. Despite the great need, amputees generally must travel abroad for advanced care. With JNF-USA’s help this is changing!
Partnering with Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, with funding from JNF-USA and others, this School (at ADI Negev’s Harvey and Gloria Kaylie Rehabilitation Medical Center) is at the forefront of changes in rehabilitation. The students in the inaugural class were chosen with great care. Each is already a licensed physical or occupational therapist with significant rehabilitative work experience. They split their time between theoretical studies at Ben-Gurion University and practical instruction at ADI Negev’s Prosthetics Center.
Stipends from JNF-USA (for books, transportation and related costs) helped convince these students to upend their lives and join this critical initiative. Hearing this, I made my own $10,000 donation to help an upcoming student make the same pivotal decision.
In addition to the new school, ADI Negev will be opening a production center to locally manufacture devices – and bring training and employment to the Negev.
Yael Dotan-Marom, the School’s Academic Director, foresees a future where “proper fitting, advanced technology and extraordinary skills will make lifelong use of prosthetics functional and pain-free." The impact this will have on individual lives, Israel, and the rehabilitation world is profound.
JNF-USA’s Israel Impact Investment Committee: Helping Israel’s Start-Ups and the Periphery Thrive
Even during times of war, JNF-USA’s Israel Impact Investment Committee (Committee) is actively fulfilling its core mission: investing in Israeli start-ups in Israel’s North and South with an objective of boosting the periphery’s economy and employment. What a win-win!
Promising early-stage companies are identified via the Committee’s connections with Israeli “incubators” and other sources. Selected companies eagerly present their new ideas, business plans, and financials at the Committee’s monthly meetings. In addition to hoped-for funding, an endorsement from JNF-USA lends these companies credibility as they seek additional investors.
The Committee performs its own assessment. Has a lead investor already done deep due diligence? Is the company in Israel’s periphery? Will it remain there after revenue begins? Does the company’s product or technology have a competitive advantage in the market they will enter?
JNF-USA is typically not the first investor nor the lead investor. To date, the Committee has evaluated more than 75 companies and has invested between $50k up to $300k per company in 22 companies.
The Committee’s work has been especially important during war and upheaval, when pure profit-oriented private equity firms won’t always meet with early-stage companies.
Several recent investments have been made in companies developing exciting and groundbreaking technologies. They include a medical device used during abdominal oncologic surgery to mitigate the risk of stray cancer cells breaking off and spreading through the body. Another company’s medical device is designed to prevent a blood clot during an ischemic stroke from flowing downstream and creating a second occurrence. A third company’s biomechanical AI analytics product, with significant military and security applications, identifies individuals’ body movements (think intruders, terrorists, and other ill-doers) in low light and foggy environments where visual identification is otherwise impossible.
Committee member Susan Chaddick says, “the intellectual horsepower, creativity and ingenuity behind these companies are incredible.”
This is JNF-USA’s circles of impact in action: helping start-up Israeli companies thrive and bringing people and jobs to Israel’s periphery.
We’re Changing Lives in Israel’s North and South.
Securing Israel’s future begins with providing enhanced medical care, opportunities for jobs and economic growth, and engaging our next generation of leaders. Learn more.
Written by Dvorah Richman, immediate past President of JNF-USA's Greater Washington Board, member of JNF-USA's: Greater Washington Board, Special Needs and Disabilities Task Force, Women for Israel, Lawyers for Israel and this year's Master Class cohort.
