Diversity the Best Option for Cuban Farmers
Patricia Grogg interviews HUMBERTO RÍOS, Cuban winner of the 2010 'Green
Nobel'
HAVANA, May 31, 2010 (IPS) - Cuban biodiversity scientist Humberto Ríos,
one of the six recipients of the 2010 Goldman Environmental Prize,
probably won't be able to collect the 150,000 dollars in prize money,
though that setback is unlikely to cause him to lose any sleep -- or
keep him from singing.
"I'm preparing my second album, with my children," he told IPS in this
interview. In his April trip to the United States to receive the award,
widely known as the "Green Nobel", Ríos visited the White House and the
U.S. Congress as part of the itinerary for the six laureates, who came
from Cambodia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Poland, Swaziland, and United States.
The Goldman Environmental Prize was created in 1990 by philanthropists
and civic leaders Richard N. and Rhoda H. Goldman to recognise
individuals for their "sustained and significant efforts to protect and
enhance the natural environment, often at great personal risk."
"When I greeted (U.S. President Barack) Obama, I told him that perhaps
for the first time a Cuban from the island was shaking his hand, and
that I had three things for him: my business card, my music -- I gave
him a copy of my first album -- and my heart, for all the people of the
United States," Ríos said.
In the 1990s, Ríos began promoting participatory crop improvement and
agro-biodiversity fairs as ways to recover and disseminate low-cost,
organic plant varieties -- a process in which small farmers are playing
the leading role.
The grassroots effort, channelled through the Programme for Local
Agricultural Innovation (PIAL), initially involved a handful of
scientists and three rural communities. Today, more than 50,000 farmers
and a hundred scientists from nine provinces are part of the movement.
Converging in the project are several local agencies and international
development aid institutions from Britain, Canada, Netherlands,
Switzerland and other countries. "PIAL has transformed rural productive
systems into more sustainable approaches and has also promoted changes
in the relations between rural men and women," he said.
Q: What is the key to achieving this degree of acceptance of the
programme in the rural community?
A: Diversity gives us options to choose what can grow best on the
available land and with fewest inputs. It allows doubling and tripling
of yields and multiplying the variety of crops, and each farmer can
redesign his or her productive system.
Furthermore, while organising seed diversity, it facilitates access and
each farmer who comes and makes selections at a biodiversity fair
becomes a micro experimental station. The only thing we ask in exchange
is that they replicate this effort with others. The important thing is
for this diversity to be spread among many.
Q: How has that strategy worked? There is a widespread idea that small
farmers are wary, and don't share…
A: No, there isn't a demand for recognition among the farmers, that it
be made known that what they are doing is important for society. They
want the local government to see that they have the solution right
there, that there is no reason to look elsewhere. They have the key to
designing a farm that can provide food without extra inputs or energy
expenditure.
Q: Would they want it to be part of Cuba's economic policy?
A: Exactly, but first the mentality has to change. Reformulating Cuba's
concepts of agriculture a little takes time, because if we push too fast
there's a risk that it will be abandoned along the way. Our agricultural
system is still based on industrial principles.
However, we can already see some steps, like urban and suburban farming,
which continue to gain ground, as do organic crops. It all lies in
enriching and perfecting those alternatives. In the middle to long term
we have to transform our paradigms of food production.
Q: Is there a risk that an improvement of Cuba's economic situation
would lead to abandoning ecological farming practices?
A: That would be the biggest mistake we could make. But I doubt that
Cuba could return to the chemicals used in farming as it did in the
1980s, because of costs. If that were to happen, it would mean
contracting a huge debt in order to pay for it, threatening our food
sovereignty.
In addition, crop diversity was lost with the industrial model of
farming applied at any price in that decade. Life showed us that the way
to go is small plots, grassroots participation, and a science that is
being built, in which the scientists have to play other roles.
Q: Why are you opposed to the production of genetically modified foods?
A: Cuba can produce a lot of evidence of how to seek food sovereignty
without turning to genetically modified crops. Using transgenic seeds is
a step backwards, because it implies a dependence on someone else in
order to grow maize, and we lack the capacity to have a formal seed
system that could supply farmers.
Q: Does the secret for confronting climate change lie in the genetic
diversity of crops?
A: Access to diversity and the right to experiment with it is what has
allowed us to overcome difficult times and have resilient productive
systems. The challenge is how to turn this not only into an alternative
for getting out of the crisis, but also into a genuine option for
agricultural development.
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