Thanks to Mariana Castillo and Sección Amarilla for their solidarity in the fight for sustainable agriculture and food sovereignty. Karina Bautista, director of the EcoAmaranth program here at Puente contributed to this article that appeared online on September 18, 2019.
Read the original article here ? https://blog.seccionamarilla.com.mx/
Photos by Fernando Gómez Carbajal
These are 10 terms to understand sustainable agriculture and food sovereignty. If these two concepts sound foreign to you, it is enough to know that both are based on the fact that food is not a commodity, but a fundamental human right that must take care of people, their cultures and the environment.
It has been said that among the global challenges we face today are crop shortages, poor diet (and diseases caused by it) and the rapid degradation of natural resources. In this sense, sustainable philosophy is totally opposed to industrial agriculture with fertilizers and chemicals, with transgenic and monoculture crops.
The type of agriculture that thinks about the consumer’s well-being throughout the entire food chain, in the short, medium, and long term. It guarantees fair income, environmental health and social and economic equity.
A scientific discipline, a set of practices, and a social movement. Looking for sustainable systems that optimize and stabilize crops, it considers multifunctional agricultural approaches, promotes social justice, nurtures identity and culture and reinforces the economic viability of rural areas.
The ability of communities to produce and consume their own food with their own political, social, cultural, and environmental rules. It is only possible through agroecology, which integrates traditional knowledge with agronomy.
Substances that contain wastes of animal, vegetable or mixed origin, which are added to the soil in order to improve their nutrition. Some examples are biol and vermi-compost, which are the controlled decomposition of organic matter that helps nourish the soil with minerals and other components necessary for good harvests in sustainable agriculture.
A type of agriculture that uses multiple crops on the same plot. An example is the milpa that integrates squash, beans, corn, fruit trees, chelites, chilies and more on the same land. It is positive for crop diversification and soil nutrition. It can be used on a larger scale if traditional knowledge is combined with practice, experience and innovation for agricultural management.
Autonomous and dynamic organizations that are formed with a group of partners (who may or may not be family members) with initiatives, interests and skills in common; that is to say, a business model that prioritizes community participation oriented to the economic growth of all the members.
The variety of life: it covers all the species of plants, animals, fungi and microorganisms that inhabit the planet. It also includes ecological and evolutionary processes at the genetic, species, and landscape levels.
When consumers take into account the social, environmental and ethical sphere when choosing a product or service and demand transparency and traceability in the processes.
The knowledge and development of methods, procedures, tools, techniques and equipment of a given community. It has social, collective and environmental preservation bases with natural biological cycles and a holistic worldview of the environment. It develops its rules and methods independently from those of large-scale agribusiness.
Economic development that is based on community, democracy, trust schemes, social ownership of resources, equitable distribution of benefits among its members and social commitment in favor of all members. For a social economy to be successful, cohesion is very important.
The challenge for sustainability, in Karina’s words, is to generate knowledge and access other practices that complement the traditional ones, that contribute and innovate with appropriate technologies. She adds that sometimes this type of knowledge can be romanticized and remain on small scales of backyard and family production. But she adds that this may be scaled to hectares and larger productions (up to 14 or 15 hectares, if applicable).
The challenge for sustainability, in Karina’s words, is to generate knowledge and access other practices that complement the traditional ones, that contribute and innovate with appropriate technologies. She adds that sometimes this type of knowledge can be romanticized and remain on small scales of backyard and family production. But she adds that this may be scaled to hectares and larger productions (up to 14 or 15 hectares, if applicable).
Gracias a El Universal, Mariana Castillo y el fotógrafo Fernando Gómez Carbajal por su serie de artículos sobre nuestro trabajo y las redes de amaranto en Oaxaca.
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