Non-literate farmer filmmakers help save biodiversity

Non-literate Indian farmers turned filmmakers to take part in research whose innovative ethical approach is described in a book and films to be launched at the UN Convention on Biological Diversity conference in Bonn.

The International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), Deccan Development Society and village-based women's groups called sanghams teamed up to study ways to sustain local food systems, the biodiversity they depend on and the livelihoods they support.

The project sparked a revival of local food culture that is helping to preserve agricultural biodiversity and traditional farming practices in several hundred villages in Medak district, Andhra Pradesh.

While these outcomes are important, the project’s methodology is itself also newsworthy.

"Too often outsiders arrive in a rural setting, impose their research on the poor and then depart without sharing the results or benefits of their studies," says Dr Michel Pimbert, director of IIED’s sustainable agriculture, biodiversity and livelihoods programme.

"In this project, the women felt both respected and empowered as they were equal partners in the design, implementation and communication of the research."

The project identified ways to sustain local crop and livestock diversity to increase people’s livelihoods options and ability to adapt to climate change. It also created stable local markets for marginalised producers to sell their surplus produce and improved local control over what is grown, in the face of pressure to conform to the needs of outsiders.

The women involved in the project decided that they wanted to use video to document the research and share its findings. The Deccan Development Society had previously trained villagers to use video and had proven that illiteracy was no barrier.

"The farmers' traditional narrative and pictorial understanding of their environment found wonderful expression in the films they made," says P.V. Satheesh of the Deccan Development Society.

"People felt both respected and empowered in the knowledge that they would be working with and communicating about this research in their own ways, at their own pace, and with significant control over the entire process."

Sangham member Humnapur Laxmamma says: "I am a seed-keeper. I store a variety of valuable seeds in the baskets in my house and with them my own knowledge of farming, environment and life. Since I learnt to use the camera, I am doing the same. I am storing knowledge of my communities with my camera and interpreting them for the outside world which does not know about this."

The project shows that local food systems, crop and livestock diversity, and livelihoods can be sustained in the face of modern pressures. As such, it offers both policy and practical guidance for the programme of work on agricultural biodiversity that the Conference of Parties of the Convention on Biological Diversity approved in 1996.

"In many parts of India and the rest of the world, contract farming, inappropriate supply chains and unfair prices for farm produce are eroding local control of food systems and the rich biodiversity and knowledge they depend on," says Pimbert.

"Sustaining biodiversity-rich food systems depends on local processes of reflection and action to secure rights, resilience and human well being. Farmers, indigenous peoples and other citizens have to be centre stage in this process of transformation and cultural affirmation for food sovereignty, with researchers, policymakers and development agencies engaged in respectful conversations and providing support when needed."

The book Affirming Life and Diversity and 12 films on 4 DVDs are being launched at the conference of parties to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity on 19 May 2008 at 14.45 in the Saal Maritim (see: IIED Event listings or Official CBD Website).

To order review copies, please contact: Vanessa Mcleod-Kourie (vanessa.mcleod-kourie@iied.org).

For interviews, please contact: P.V. Satheesh of the Deccan Development Society (satheeshperiyapatna@yahoo.com) or Michel Pimbert of the International Institute for Environment and Development (michel.pimbert@iied.org)

For more information, please contact:
Mike Shanahan
Press Officer
International Institute for Environment and Development
Email: mike.shanahan@iied.org
Tel: +44 (0)20 7872 7256
Fax: +44 (0)20 7388 2826
www.iied.org

Notes to editors

The International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) is an independent, non-profit research institute. Set up in 1971 and based in London, IIED provides expertise and leadership in researching and achieving sustainable development (see: www.iied.org).

The Deccan Development Society (DDS), is a two-decade old grassroots organisation working in about 75 villages with women's Sanghams (voluntary village level associations of the poor) in Medak District of Andhra Pradesh. The 5000 women members of the Society represent the poorest of the poor in their village communities. Most of them are dalits, the lowest group in the Indian social hierarchy (see: www.ddsindia.com/www/default.asp).

The Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity have called for the "Mobilization of farming communities, including indigenous and local communities, for the development, maintenance and use of their knowledge and practices in the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity in the agricultural sector" and encourage countries "to set up and maintain local level forums for farmers, researchers, extension workers and other stakeholders to evolve genuine partnerships." (COP CBD Decision III/11, 1996).

Food Sovereignty is "the right of peoples to define their own food and agriculture; to protect and regulate domestic agricultural production and trade in order to achieve sustainable development objectives; to determine the extent to which they want to be self reliant; to restrict the dumping of products in their markets; and to provide local fisheries-based communities the priority in managing the use of and the rights to aquatic resources. Food Sovereignty does not negate trade, but rather it promotes the formulation of trade policies and practices that serve the rights of peoples to food and to safe, healthy and ecologically sustainable production." (www.viacampesina.org).