Selection 41

The following is my take on a selection from Environmental Studies, by Thomas Easton. This is it in a nutshell, tried to get the just of what the author was saying. Please leave a comment of your take on these issues.

Women’s Indigenous Knowledge and Biodiversity Conservation

In places like 3^rd world countries, the likelihood of the village depends on the surrounding resources. So the likelihood of the village goes hand in hand with the town sustaining the resource.

Biodiversity can be just as productive if not more than a monoculture area. This misconception is brought on by the commercial thought, but in reality biodiversity is productive in so many more ways than monoculture systems.

In these areas that depend on biodiversity (resources) the switch from biodiversity to monoculture actually causes job loss, as it takes fewer people to cultivate these monoculture crops. So in places with few job openings like 3^rd world countries, this job loss might be the difference between the survival or failure of the village. So biodiversity conservation will be linked to the livelihood of the villages.

Womens work has not been seen as productive work because their work is in various fields, and in large quantities. This includes the type of work that isn’t paid for, like taking care of families.

When looking at growing foods from seeds, women have large amounts of education on the right conditions to grow seeds; humidity, weather, etc.[1]Women also use this great knowledge in places like India, to produce, breed and nurture farm animals that would otherwise been imported.

With the eco-movement women have now increased food supplies by practices that focus on biodiversity, and multiple crops. Their knowledge should be given for future improvements in agriculture. Women have such a big role in the development and sustainability of biodiversity, yet it is not appreciated or counted as “real work,” in these 3^rd world countries¹.

Lately we’ve been seeing the destruction of diversity in agriculture and farming. The introduction of vast networks of monoculture agriculture has been the killing off of native species in plants. This goes against traditional Indian farming¹, where diversity is celebrated and put into practice.

Farming nowadays sees the traditional “seed saving” farmers dying, and the multinational corporations that design seeds so they no longer regenerate, so farmers are forced to keep coming back and buying seeds. After all you can’t make money (as a corporation) if your customer only needs to buy once, and then grow their own seeds the following years.

This has caused an uprising in local farmers, because they no longer can save seeds. Corporations have the rights to their seed and make it illegal for farmers to save seed. These patents on seed have two disadvantages; they stop third world producers from biodiversity and steal the right for customers to buy safe, healthy foods¹.

Genetically altered food has a number of risks; toxins, nutritional decrease, allergies, lack of antibiotics, etc¹. So trust issues with major companies like Monsanto arise. Is it safe to trust companies that introduced pesticides in food?

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[1] Environmental Studies, Thomas Easton ( Selection 41, Vandana Shiva)