Financial and economic ministers from around the world met this last Sunday in Washington, DC and, of all things, talked about food. This might have been a way to dodge talking about crumbling conditions in the world’s capital markets. But something more imminent seemed to be on their minds. The president of the International Monetary Fund said: “As we know in the past, sometimes those questions lead to war. We now need to devote 100 percent of our time to these questions.”
“These questions” refers to the political instability caused by rising food prices in nations such as Haiti, Egypt, the Philippines, Niger, and up to 36 others and how to prevent that instability from toppling those nation’s governments. Robert Zoellick, former US representative to the World Trade Organization and now president of the World Bank, said “We have to put our money where our mouth is now, so that we can put food into hungry mouths.” The answer that these men offered to “these questions” revolved around how to increase the commitment of industrialized nations to funding food aid to poor nations.
No one talked about how to enable the people of these nations to return to their traditional agricultural practices so that they will be self-sufficient as well as return to their traditional diets. Instead, their solution is to export crops produced in overabundance by agribusinesses in industrialized countries supported by government subsidies sent to a handful of farmers whose mailing addresses are in Manhattan.
A real answer to “these questions” presented itself at the same time that the world’s financial bigwigs were wringing their hands. One of the six winners of the Goldman Environmental Prize, Jesus León Santos, is revitalizing traditional agricultural practices in Oaxaca, Mexico. Starting over 20 years ago with a small tree planting project, his organization is reversing the erosion that started with the European invasion 500 years ago, stopping the out migration of people from the region devastated by the North American Free Trade Agreement, and returning native food crops to cultivation. We know it as sustainable agriculture.
The 1500 farmers in this movement use manure, not chemical fertilizer. They don’t use pesticides. And there isn’t a GMO crop in site. They’re not following these practices out of an environmental consciousness as we urbanized folk would understand it. They’re doing it because it empowers them.
Although the Oaxacan farmers receive some outside support, it’s the day-to-day magic of people supporting each other, using local knowledge, and strengthening their way of life that has made this movement a success.
Compare and contrast: wealthy nations dropping surplus commodities on hungry people displaced from their traditional agricultural practices by the very organizations responsible in whole or in part for creating these emergency conditions; versus people working together to restore the productivity of their land through traditional agricultural practices. It’s top-down versus bottom-up.
The Oaxacan farmers’ solution is such a good one that other farmers from around the world—including some in the United States—are talking to them.
The Sustainable Health Institute advocates just such solutions from the bottom up. It’s about people using local knowledge to build a thriving community. It’s about sharing that knowledge among communities. And while outside support is often critical in creating healthy communities, medical interventions (the equivalent of importing subsidized food to put into hungry mouths) whether conventional or alternative are not the answer—handy for an emergency, but not for sustainability. The economic, intellectual, and emotional resources that sustain our health are the one’s that feed our strength.
