Nearly four billion people around the world rely on agricultural food systems for their livelihoods, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.
Plants sustain the daily nutritional needs of people around the world, many of whom are also engaged in the cultivation and distribution of these agricultural goods. As the climate changes, so too are the rules of the game to succeed in bringing crops to harvest. Several UBC Forestry & Environmental Stewardship faculty members are actively engaged in research with communities in BC and abroad to investigate how to support, introduce or adapt food crops to shifting local and environmental landscapes.
Around 30-35% of global food production transpires on fewer than two hectares of land, called smallholder farms. “Smallholders who claim ownership of this land may have worked its soils for generations, carrying with them rich, place-based knowledge of the cultivation of a suite of plants, including agroforestry crops,” says Janette Bulkan, Assoc. Prof. in the Department of Forest Resources Management at UBC Forestry & Environmental Stewardship.
For decades, Janette has led research with Indigenous peoples in Guyana on the production of food crops, among them varieties of bitter cassava (Manihot esculenta) selectively propagated by Indigenous Peoples in the Amazon Basin long before the arrival of Europeans in the 1500s. The naturally occurring cyanide in the bitter cassava enables the plants to thrive despite myriad fungal pathogens and insects in their habitat.
“Amazonian Indigenous Peoples developed a sophisticated method for separating the cyanide from the rasped and mashed cassava tubers before baking the soft white flour,” notes Janette. “The denatured cyanide is used as a meat tenderiser. Nothing is wasted from this versatile plant.”
Among the Makushi People in southern Guyana, 140-170 varieties of cassava are recognised by women farmers for their distinct plant morphologies, soil suitablilities, flood tolerance, drought resistance and nutritional properties. Cassava plant stem cuttings are actively exchanged between friends and extended families, enabling their swift and wide distribution.
“For people living in parts of Peru to French Guiana, it is common knowledge that, when you have a cassava farm, you won’t starve.” — Janette Bulkan
“Farmers know which cassava varietals are best-suited to different environmental conditions, such as flooding and drought, as well as for different uses,” adds Janette. “Grown on the Guyana shield — among the most nutrient-poor soils in the world — this knowledge could be applied to growing crops elsewhere.”
On the other side of the Atlantic Ocean in the northern part of the Sub-Saharan African country of Ghana, Terry Sunderland, UBC Forestry & Environmental Stewardship Prof. in the Department of Forest and Conservation Sciences, is leading a project on pressing food sovereignty and economic livelihood barriers facing women smallholders who are unable to gain legal title over the shea parklands that they harvest. The project is being undertaken with UBC Forestry & Environmental Stewardship graduate students and Ghana’s University for Development Studies, with support from the Peter Gilgan Foundation.
“Women are the guardians of food security in the region,” says Terry. “Empowering women smallholders with shea agroforestry operations can have ripple effects throughout their communities in terms of increased economic opportunities, food security and ecological resilience.”
Native shea predominantly grows along a narrow, semi-arid Sahelian geographic zone that stretches across parts of northern Ghana, Burkina Faso and northern Nigeria. A staple, edible fruit with the consistency of avocado and the flavour of mango, the kernel inside the nut of the shea fruit contains shea butter, which is used locally as a cooking oil and body oil.
Shea butter is also a key ingredient in creams and other commercial products sold on international markets, including in North America. However, most of the profits from shea butter production occur following manufacturing. Women smallholders, who almost solely sell the raw product, realize a miniscule fraction of the gains from their labour.
“Shea parklands present a significant, ongoing opportunity for women smallholders to achieve economic independence, particularly in a region where wider income opportunities and food availability are scarce.” — Terry Sunderland
“Shea is a longer-term, sustainable source of income for Ghanaians,” says Terry. “One approach that we are investigating with women smallholders is identifying opportunities to create value-added shea products locally that can be sold on local and international markets, retaining more of the profits of the production of shea among women smallholders.”
Another challenge facing the region is the decline in shea trees in northern Ghana agroforestry parklands from an estimated average of 230 trees per hectare in the 1940s to fewer than 11 trees per hectare in 2011. The reasons for this decline range from climate change to urban expansion, subsistence farming for annual crops and tree removal for fuelwood or charcoal.
“Within the past 10 years, the region has experienced significantly more extreme weather in the form of severe storms, droughts and floods that have put increased stress on food and commercial crop production,” says Terry.
Importantly, active cultivation is a necessary ingredient in improved shea tree survival rates. “Without human oversight and husbandry, less than 25% of trees survive long enough to produce commercially viable shea fruit,” Terry explains. “Women smallholders play an integral role in increasing shea tree survival through active cultivation, contributing to a stable source of income for them and their families, as well as addressing issues surrounding food security and ecological degradation.”