Course Topic: Modern and indigenous Agricultural Knowledge Systems/ Wielding the Power of Technology for Food Production
New agricultural practices are sprouting up everywhere. In our globalized food system, farming techniques and plant varieties are constantly changing to accommodate larger yields and profits. In many cases, indigenous agricultural practices and knowledge systems are being displaced by technology and the modern knowledge that comes with it. I looked at the “Green Grabs and Biochar: Revaluing
African Soils and Farming in the New Carbon Economy” article by Melissa Leach et. al. and the “Ricekeepers” article by Winona LaDuke.
A similarity in these articles was the issue of patenting and indigenous rights. LaDuke writes about the Californian company Nor-Cal and their patent of “wild rice”- which LaDuke considers the collective property of the Ojibwe people. The Leach et. al. article mentions the money to be made with biochar in carbon trading. This article describes the patenting and “financialisation” around biochar ignoring the possible intellectual property claims by the farmers already producing ADE (anthropogenic dark soils- biochar) through indigenous practices in the Amazon and in Africa. There are already companies like Outback Biochar, Re:Char, Dare to Imagine, and Crucible Carbon that are ready to make a profit with biochar (“Green Grabs” 301).
Before introducing a new agricultural technology to an area, it is important to look at the systems already in place and the people operating within those systems. An example from the “Green Grabs and Biochar” article is the failed Biochar Fund, set up as a rural development project in Africa. This fund assumed that farmers would be able and willing to permanently transform their farming systems and reconfigure the social institutions that surrounded them just for the introduction of biochar (301). This article then explains that the Liberian case study shows “West African societies produce ADE, but in ways deeply embedded in, and inseparable from, social, political and agro-ecological trajectories in historical landscapes. Biochar development projects are unlikely to succeed if they do not tailor their interventions to local societies and their diverse political and historical ecologies (301)”. It is understandable that indigenous groups might not be interested in technology that would radically change their traditional agricultural practices.
Comparing the two articles, I questioned what would happen to the Liberian farmers who did alter their traditional farming practices and livelihoods to accommodate biochar production in the pilot program. What would happen if biochar became a financial success in the world of carbon trading and large-scale biochar production became profitable? Will biomass plantations move into areas deemed “marginal” or “empty” through land-grabbing and “disregard the myriad agricultural, pastoralist, collecting, and other livelihood activities carried out there” (292)?” Would the Liberian farmer be able to compete with the biomass plantations- or would it be like when domesticated “wild” rice was cultivated in paddies by combines and then destabilized the rice-based traditional Ojibwe economy? If this were the case, the Nigerian farmer would not be able to make much money off of the alteration of farming practices for the sake of biochar. They may, at least, benefit from some improved soil.
These articles also bring up the discussion of scale. In the LaDuke article, scale is mostly about the contrasting sizes of wild vs. “wild” rice harvests. It is also about the scale of biodiversity within the wild rice species and the surrounding plant and animal health. I thought the most important scale in the “Green Grabs and Biochar” was the amount of small farmers using biochar production practices it would take for biochar to live up to its promise as a “climate change solution”. I think both of these articles provide a glimpse into how wielding technology for food production can impact indigenous agricultural systems. There can be benefits and detriments- it is important to look at who will profit in the long run.
Works Cited:
LaDuke, Winona. “Ricekeepers”. Orion Magazine July/August 2007. Print
Melissa Leach , James Fairhead & James Fraser (2012) Green grabs and biochar: Revaluing African soils and farming in the new carbon economy, The Journal of Peasant Studies, 39:2, 285-307.