Periodic Reporting for period 2 - SeedsValues (Flourishing Seeds. Value Creation and Relatedness in Agrobiodiversity Hotspots)
Période du rapport: 2022-08-01 au 2024-01-31
Agriculture condenses the most pressing challenges humans are facing today: food marginalization, market instabilities and ecological devastation. Despite the massive increase in food crop production it facilitated in the past century, the intensification of agriculture has proved to be noxious. Driven by a quest for monetary profits, the agro-industry spreads worldwide at the expense of socio-ecological welfare. Beside soils and water contamination, the FAO estimates that some 75% of plant genetic diversity was dropped out of the fields in the course of the past century. This exhaustion was caused by the massive distribution of high-yielding varieties, fitting with productiveness requirement and the narrow criteria of Distinctness Homogeneity and Stability (DHS) enforced by the seed industry. After decades of production intensification through monoculture and chemicals, international policy makers and civil society are now stressing the importance of biodiverse and low input cultivation as key steps toward sustainable agriculture. It is now widely acknowledged that the possibility of nurturing humanity in the context of climate upheavals will depend on our capacity to expand the gamut of cultivated crop varieties.
International institutions’ reports have pointed out the vital role of value assessment to implement favourable conditions for the restoration of plentiful agriculture. However, value discrepancies are key obstacles toward variegated fields which are labour intensive, while only offering precarious livelihood in the capitalist economy. If we are to promote agricultural practices that foster human and non-human flourishing, we need to appreciate the multiplicity of crops existences, and understand how their values articulate with market prices. This question is not only vital to the billion people who rely on farm saved seeds for their survival. Cultivating biodiverse fields is also crucial for maintaining lively soils and water, fostering thereby the restoration of exhausted ecologies. In such a context, it is concerning that we lack fundamental knowledge on the importance of the myriad varieties of plants looked after by agricultural communities across the globe. This project fills this gap by scrutinising seeds’ values in domestication centres where growers continue to care for increased diversity of plants in their fields, despite little monetary reward on capitalist markets.
The ecological desolation caused by the agroindustry shows that the multiple existences of domesticated plants remain underestimated. The SeedsValues furthers mainstream assessment in economic terms, by shedding light on the ethical engagements and affective attachments that incentivise farmers to perpetuate lively agriculture. Therefore, it produces ethnographies of seed-human relatedness in three agrobiodiversity hotspots: potato chacras in Peru, maize milpas in Mexico and rice paddies in Laos. In each setting, agricultural companionship in highland plots intended for self-consumption are compared with lowland intensive plantations.
International institutions’ reports have pointed out the vital role of value assessment to implement favourable conditions for the restoration of plentiful agriculture. However, value discrepancies are key obstacles toward variegated fields which are labour intensive, while only offering precarious livelihood in the capitalist economy. If we are to promote agricultural practices that foster human and non-human flourishing, we need to appreciate the multiplicity of crops existences, and understand how their values articulate with market prices. This question is not only vital to the billion people who rely on farm saved seeds for their survival. Cultivating biodiverse fields is also crucial for maintaining lively soils and water, fostering thereby the restoration of exhausted ecologies. In such a context, it is concerning that we lack fundamental knowledge on the importance of the myriad varieties of plants looked after by agricultural communities across the globe. This project fills this gap by scrutinising seeds’ values in domestication centres where growers continue to care for increased diversity of plants in their fields, despite little monetary reward on capitalist markets.
The ecological desolation caused by the agroindustry shows that the multiple existences of domesticated plants remain underestimated. The SeedsValues furthers mainstream assessment in economic terms, by shedding light on the ethical engagements and affective attachments that incentivise farmers to perpetuate lively agriculture. Therefore, it produces ethnographies of seed-human relatedness in three agrobiodiversity hotspots: potato chacras in Peru, maize milpas in Mexico and rice paddies in Laos. In each setting, agricultural companionship in highland plots intended for self-consumption are compared with lowland intensive plantations.
Since the beginning of the project, ethnographic investigation has been carried out in three domestication centers: maize-human relatedness in Mexico, rice-human relatedness in Laos and, potato-human relatedness in Peru. Two researchers have produced ethnographic data in Oaxaca: Gabriel Roman in the highland Mixe community of Tamazulapam and Dr Owen McNamara in the lowland of Valle Central. Two researchers have produced ethnographic data in Luang Prabang: Anna-Céline Sommerfeld in a highland Khmu community of the Phonxay district and Dr Paul David Lutz in the lowland of Nambak district. I have been in charge of the ethnographic investigation in the highland and lowland of Cuzco.
The main outcomes for the Mexican branch of the project were produced by Dr McNamara who published, in an anthropology journal, an article on maize-human mutual vulnerabilities in post-covid Oaxaca. He presented his work in different conferences and also organised an international conference on The Politics and Political Possibilities of Alternative Food Movements at the Université libre de Bruxelles in September 2023. Gabriel Roman has created a Mixe glossary of milpa cultivation related vocabulary. This is an experimental ethnographic methodology as well as a community outreach. A chapter of his thesis related to maize seeds care will be presented in December 2023 to a board of conservation experts at the GCIAR maize conservation facility (Cimmyt) in Mexico.
The outcome of the Lao branch is forthcoming as this cluster of the project was set up later.
In Peru, I have continued my fieldwork on potato-human relatedness in the highland of Cuzco, which I have complemented with preliminary investigation in lower fields. I registered more than 90 potatoes for the creation of a Subversive Seeds Catalogue, a varietal album introducing native potatoes independently of the Distinction Homogeneity Stability criteria of laboratory breeders, and the Linnaeus classifications of botanical sciences. I have started collaboration with Domino Production for the realisation of a documentary film tracing the colonial journey of the potato from the Andes to Europe. This journey reveals the cosmopolitical encounters set forth by the colonial extraction of tuberous kin for their capitalist exploitation a "resource." This cosmopolitical encounter is also revealed in a website on Potato Poetries produced in collaboration with my Peruvian partners as part of the After Progress virtual exhibition curated by Dr Martin Savransky and Dr Craig Lundy. I have co-organised an international conference on Tuberous Collectivities at the University of Cambridge.
In line with the overall theme of the project, I co-organised an international conference on Respecting Seeds at the University of Cambridge, gathering an interdisciplinary collective of seed experts in STS, history, anthropology, philosophy, cultural studies, and environmental sciences. This meeting has established an interdisciplinary collective of seed experts from Europe, America and Australia with projects of further collaborations.
The main outcomes for the Mexican branch of the project were produced by Dr McNamara who published, in an anthropology journal, an article on maize-human mutual vulnerabilities in post-covid Oaxaca. He presented his work in different conferences and also organised an international conference on The Politics and Political Possibilities of Alternative Food Movements at the Université libre de Bruxelles in September 2023. Gabriel Roman has created a Mixe glossary of milpa cultivation related vocabulary. This is an experimental ethnographic methodology as well as a community outreach. A chapter of his thesis related to maize seeds care will be presented in December 2023 to a board of conservation experts at the GCIAR maize conservation facility (Cimmyt) in Mexico.
The outcome of the Lao branch is forthcoming as this cluster of the project was set up later.
In Peru, I have continued my fieldwork on potato-human relatedness in the highland of Cuzco, which I have complemented with preliminary investigation in lower fields. I registered more than 90 potatoes for the creation of a Subversive Seeds Catalogue, a varietal album introducing native potatoes independently of the Distinction Homogeneity Stability criteria of laboratory breeders, and the Linnaeus classifications of botanical sciences. I have started collaboration with Domino Production for the realisation of a documentary film tracing the colonial journey of the potato from the Andes to Europe. This journey reveals the cosmopolitical encounters set forth by the colonial extraction of tuberous kin for their capitalist exploitation a "resource." This cosmopolitical encounter is also revealed in a website on Potato Poetries produced in collaboration with my Peruvian partners as part of the After Progress virtual exhibition curated by Dr Martin Savransky and Dr Craig Lundy. I have co-organised an international conference on Tuberous Collectivities at the University of Cambridge.
In line with the overall theme of the project, I co-organised an international conference on Respecting Seeds at the University of Cambridge, gathering an interdisciplinary collective of seed experts in STS, history, anthropology, philosophy, cultural studies, and environmental sciences. This meeting has established an interdisciplinary collective of seed experts from Europe, America and Australia with projects of further collaborations.
During the next phase of the project, I will finalise the Subversive Seeds Catalogue. This offers progress beyond the state of the art in terms of ethnographic methodology, and revealing cosmopolitics around botanical knowledge on cultivated plants. I am coediting a collective volume on Tuberous Worlds: Vegetal Politics and More-than-Human relations with Prof. David Nally, the co-convenor of the Tuberous Worlds conference. This volume opens new avenues for the understanding of vegetal politics by considering tubers not only as crop but also as life companions and subject of knowledge. The second event on Respecting Seeds is giving birth to another editorial collaboration for the publication of a special issue on The Politics of Seeds Care under Capitalism.
I wrote an article on the ethics of human-plant relations forthcoming in an interdisciplinary journal on Environmental Humanities. I will finish the writing of an article on tuberous kinship as affective attunement to be submitted in an anthropology journal at the beginning of 2024. I will also write a journal article on the making of the Subversive Seeds Catalogue. By describing the main challenges I faced when registering tuberous kin, this article will enlighten the epistemological violence of Western practices of cataloguing and classifying.
During the second phase of the project, I will work on the documentary tracing the colonial journey of the potato from the Andes to Europe and the colonial extraction of tuberous kin for their capitalist exploitation a "resource;" even though the film will hardly be released before the project ends.
Dr Owen McNamara is writing a second article on the politics of native corn revitalization movement in Oaxaca. He also has an article on the politics of agroecology under review. Gabriel Roman is producing a fine-grained ethnography on the challenge of maize diversity conservation under capitalist pressure in the center of domestication. His examination of practices of care for native varieties of maize will be developed as a PhD manuscript. Gabriel Roman will further outreach activities around the Mixe glossary on maize cultivation. He is thereby producing an original ethnographic methodology as well as examining the entanglement between language semiotic and agrobiodiversity conservation in the context of capitalist expansion.
Dr Lutz is now producing data on the Lao branch of the project. He is examining the complexities of the lowland wet-rice and upland swidden dynamic as a social and political practice articulated on rice-human (un)relatedness. He is also documenting an historical and ongoing process of disenchantment in human-rice relations as cultivators move away from swidden cultivation in higher fields to lower irrigated plots and towards commodification. The outcomes of this cluster are still under development. Dr Lutz is preparing a public outreach seminar at the Traditional Arts and Ethnology Centre (TAEC) in Luang Prabang in February 2024, as well as presentations in academic conferences. He has written a chapter on conducting fieldwork in upland rice swiddens, for a volume edited by himself and Dr. Rosalie Stolz, currently under review.
During the first semester of 2024, I will convene the team for a writing workshop where we will cross fertilise the results of the three branches of the project and agree on the collective outputs we aim to produce. As far as I see, I intend to develop two main collective works. On the one hand, I hope we produce a collective article on Becoming Lowland, comparing Dr Lutz finding with the other field sites. Our collective investigation is showing that the opposition between highland and lowland classically used in social sciences and agricultural studies, as well as policy making, is not relevant as an ecological opposition in the field sites we study. We observe that this contrast is instead used as a social construct entailing economic positioning and racist marginalisation. Depending on the outcome of our collective discussions during the workshop, we may edit a special issue on agricultural affect, a topic that we have already collectively engaged in a team workshop in June 2022.
In the latest phase of the project, I also plan to curate an exhibition gathering botanical artists who together document the many reproductive possibilities of what is commonly referred to as "seeds."
I wrote an article on the ethics of human-plant relations forthcoming in an interdisciplinary journal on Environmental Humanities. I will finish the writing of an article on tuberous kinship as affective attunement to be submitted in an anthropology journal at the beginning of 2024. I will also write a journal article on the making of the Subversive Seeds Catalogue. By describing the main challenges I faced when registering tuberous kin, this article will enlighten the epistemological violence of Western practices of cataloguing and classifying.
During the second phase of the project, I will work on the documentary tracing the colonial journey of the potato from the Andes to Europe and the colonial extraction of tuberous kin for their capitalist exploitation a "resource;" even though the film will hardly be released before the project ends.
Dr Owen McNamara is writing a second article on the politics of native corn revitalization movement in Oaxaca. He also has an article on the politics of agroecology under review. Gabriel Roman is producing a fine-grained ethnography on the challenge of maize diversity conservation under capitalist pressure in the center of domestication. His examination of practices of care for native varieties of maize will be developed as a PhD manuscript. Gabriel Roman will further outreach activities around the Mixe glossary on maize cultivation. He is thereby producing an original ethnographic methodology as well as examining the entanglement between language semiotic and agrobiodiversity conservation in the context of capitalist expansion.
Dr Lutz is now producing data on the Lao branch of the project. He is examining the complexities of the lowland wet-rice and upland swidden dynamic as a social and political practice articulated on rice-human (un)relatedness. He is also documenting an historical and ongoing process of disenchantment in human-rice relations as cultivators move away from swidden cultivation in higher fields to lower irrigated plots and towards commodification. The outcomes of this cluster are still under development. Dr Lutz is preparing a public outreach seminar at the Traditional Arts and Ethnology Centre (TAEC) in Luang Prabang in February 2024, as well as presentations in academic conferences. He has written a chapter on conducting fieldwork in upland rice swiddens, for a volume edited by himself and Dr. Rosalie Stolz, currently under review.
During the first semester of 2024, I will convene the team for a writing workshop where we will cross fertilise the results of the three branches of the project and agree on the collective outputs we aim to produce. As far as I see, I intend to develop two main collective works. On the one hand, I hope we produce a collective article on Becoming Lowland, comparing Dr Lutz finding with the other field sites. Our collective investigation is showing that the opposition between highland and lowland classically used in social sciences and agricultural studies, as well as policy making, is not relevant as an ecological opposition in the field sites we study. We observe that this contrast is instead used as a social construct entailing economic positioning and racist marginalisation. Depending on the outcome of our collective discussions during the workshop, we may edit a special issue on agricultural affect, a topic that we have already collectively engaged in a team workshop in June 2022.
In the latest phase of the project, I also plan to curate an exhibition gathering botanical artists who together document the many reproductive possibilities of what is commonly referred to as "seeds."