Food Sovereignty

Oaxacan Native societies have been passing down the scientific knowledge of agronomy for thousands of years. This science has allowed Oaxacans to domesticate, cultivate, and select the ingredients to prepare their world-renowned foods—modeling a system called food sovereignty. Food sovereignty is the right that people have to control their own local food systems and consume food grown through ecological, sustainable, and culturally appropriate ways.

We can learn a lot about the connections between current Oaxacan agricultural and ecological practices by studying the material evidence left behind by Indigenous societies long ago. For example, over the course of thirteen thousand years, Indigenous agronomists domesticated a grass called teosinte through scientific observation, documentation, and application. This impressive scientific process resulted in genetically modified grass turning into corn. The earliest documented corn kernels were found in a cave in the Oaxacan Central Valley called Guíla Naquitz and date back thirteen thousand years. This makes Oaxaca the birthplace of corn. Other archeological examples of Indigenous Oaxacan scientific evidence include: seeds that demonstrate ethnomedical practices, tools such as sharp objects fabricated from volcanic glass (obsidian), and animal bones. Indigenous communal practices are particularly important to the success of scientific knowledge transmission.

This is the same applied expertise that allows Oaxacans of today to reproduce cultural practices outside of the communities of origin. Through cultural reproduction and oral transmission, Indigenous communities harvest and prepare special foods in California using the ingredients that their ancestors began cultivating thirteen thousand years ago in Oaxaca. Native agronomy and the meals prepared in our communities are forms of art which Oaxacans proudly share with the world. Each generation selects what it wants to maintain in this chronology of wisdom, and in this way the diverse Indigenous communities demonstrate their self-determination. This Indigenous knowledge which includes ecological practices are valuable practices to our society today as we seek more sustainable ways to live on this earth into the future.
— Dr. Xóchitl Flores-Marcial

KEY TERMS:

Food Sovereignty: food system in which the people who produce, distribute, and consume food also control the mechanisms and policies of food production and distribution. This stands in contrast to the present corporate food regime, in which corporations and market institutions control the global food system.

Communality: The state or condition of being communal. A feeling or spirit of cooperation and belonging arising from common interests and goals.

Indigenous farmworkers: Until the 1980’s most farm workers came from central Mexico. This changed after the implementation of NAFTA. Local indigenous communities were hardest hit as cheaper goods drove up competition, devastating local economies and small Indigenous owned farmlands became privatized. For many, migration north was the only option at making a living. Then and now indigenous migrant workers faced social exclusion due to language barriers, cultural differences, and racism. The Central Valley is now home to 165,000 indigenous farmworkers from a variety of Mexican states and who identify with different Indigenous Mexican cultures population, languages/dialects

Exploitative labor: Often because of legal status, indigenous farmworkers lack basic social safety-nets. This, paired with fear of deportation, inability to speak or write in Spanish or English can make attaining gainful employment extremely difficult and almost impossible. This allows for many indigenous farmworkers to be taken advantage of. Illegal work conditions, job insecurity, a lack of sufficient income, hazardous chemical exposure, and lack of health insurance are only a few ways that this population has been historically exploited. Though there are organizations and institutions who make the effort of informing indigenous farmworkers of their rights, many are afraid to speak up.

Indigenous Oaxacan workforce: Account for over 20% of all farmworkers in California and are the fastest growing farmworker population.

Systemic Racism: A form of racism that is embedded in the laws and regulations of a society or an organization.

Exclusion: Exclusion from social safety nets and benefits, along with structural racism within the hierarchy of farm labor contributes to poor health outcomes, lower quality of life, lower wages, and more dangerous working conditions for indigenous farmworkers than Mestizo and Latino farmworkers.

Identity and food as an anchor Food systems like community gardens shed light on the efforts made by indigenous communities to create self-sustainability. This places value on communal labor, land stewardship, self-expression, and the need to ground their traditions and identity. Food enables connection among diverse linguistic, migratory, and cultural experiences of families and communities. It is also an effort to control their present and dictate their futures through demonstrating the power of and the need for a wider community.