The Alchemy of Agroecology

Harriet Friedmann is a retired professor of interdisciplinary food studies. She writes and lectures internationally on political ecology of food and works with the Toronto Food Policy Council, food movements, and international organisations to change the food system.

Fulvio Gioanetto is one of the new practitioners linking formal science with Indigenous and practical knowledge. He also connects places that seem very different in Canada and Mexico. Two points stand out for me in this video. One is how Fulvio links different kinds of knowledge. The second is what “local” means, and how that relates to “markets.”

Fulvio shows us “how easy it is” to use plants that have been discarded and disdained by industrial agriculture – so-called “weeds” – to make fertilizers and pesticides. He says, “If you need science, use a book!” Fulvio is a trained agronomist as well as an agroecologist, so he is familiar with both industrial and ecological farming. In this video he demonstrates how to combine formal science with practical knowledge. This shows that experts can work collaboratively with farmers, whether experienced or new farmers just starting out. And now everyone can learn more easily on the internet. It opens the possibility of citizen science, in which farmers can define problems and contribute data to investigate them. Imagine farmers in a region with an insect problem sharing data, even photos, on smartphones! This kind of citizen science is being done for wildlife; why not for farming?

It is helpful to think about Indigenous knowledge as place-based but interconnected across places. Colonial empires and industrial agriculture suppressed local knowledge and practices everywhere, in Europe as well as in colonies. For instance, stinging nettles, which are native to parts of Europe, Asia and North Africa, were used for centuries as medicine, as attractor for pollinating insects, as animal feed, and as fibres for textiles. People in different places discovered these uses despite stings from touching the plant! In each place they gave nettles a distinct name, which can reasonably be called “Indigenous,” such as “hot and sharp biting plants.” As colonial empires moved plants from one part of the world to another, a standard system of Latin names developed (for nettles, Urtica dioica). With industrial agriculture nettles came to be considered a weed in both Europe and the colonies, even though some gardeners and farmers continued to use nettles as well as tea. Agroecologists in many parts of the world can now recover its uses. Now Fulvio takes knowledge from one place to another. This is a very different kind of “global” connection from the top-down one that makes every place the same and turns that knowledge into private property.

What do these ways of being “global” imply for “markets”? It might be easy to conclude that food sovereignty means no markets at all. However, Fulvio and his partner Maria make natural farming inputs and medicines to sell locally. This is efficient and helps everyone, the sellers and the buyers. The challenge is to keep these exchanges at the proper scale. It is the chemical manufacturers who create “global” markets that disrupt the circular, place-based relations that Fulvio demonstrates in both Mexico and Canada. Part of agroecology is reshaping markets, so that farmers, people making natural inputs, and people preparing and buying food all connect at the proper scale. People with specialized skills can exchange them, and growers, cooks, and eaters in distant places can learn from each other.