Agroecology and the Struggle for Food Sovereignty ... - Yale University

practicing agroecology, using local knowledge
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Practicing Agroecology, Using Local
Knowledge
Report by Margarita Fernández
This session raised a number of important questions about how local, traditional, or
indigenous knowledge is defined, produced, controlled, and preserved. There was
much debate among participants about what terminology to use in representing
farmer knowledge: local, traditional, or indigenous? From this discussion emerged a
rich exchange of people’s perceptions and experiences about the process of creating
knowledge and the shifts in power and control associated with who creates that
knowledge and how it is shared.
Ronaldo Lec, from IMAP (Instituto Mesoamericano de Permacultura) in
Guatemala, believes that “local” is a better term than “traditional,” but he noted that
local knowledge is often misrepresented. For example, slash-and-burn farming can be
more productive than conventional sedentary agriculture, but often can’t be practiced
due to land tenure systems and property rights restrictions, so farmers have switched to
other systems. Lec added that people from the North and universities in Guatemala
often bring in outside formulas and technologies without considering local knowledge.
Michael Dorsey, from Dartmouth College, raised a number of questions that
sparked interesting discussion: Where is the boundary between local/traditional
knowledge and other types of knowledge (scientific, foreign, etc.)? If that boundary
doesn’t exist, does local knowledge exist? Why has it been discussed for 20 years?
Silvia Rodríguez, from GRAIN (Genetic Resources Action International), believes
that more concrete definitions are needed. Some say that “traditional” knowledge
refers only to indigenous communities, while “local” refers more to peasants. Karl
Zimmerer, from the University of Wisconsin, added that there is a “blurring of
boundaries, a continuum of knowledge.” He gave the example of Andean potato
farmers and Mexican corn growers taking Green Revolution technologies and seed
varieties, renaming them, finding out something from agricultural extensionists, and
weaving them somewhat seamlessly into local knowledge. Is this “scientific” or
“local”? Zimmerer added that the focus on knowledge systems traces back to
ethnobotany, an object-oriented style of categorizing information and making use of
it. This emphasizes the “thingness” of knowledge rather than the process itself, which
is adjustable, evolutionary, and something that can be learned quickly.
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