A two-day national seminar that concluded here on Wednesday stressed the need for supporting and popularising local and indigenous food systems and conservation of native seed diversity to build resilience in the context of possible decline in food production owing to climate change.
The seminar on ‘Food and Nutrition Security in the Context of Climate Change’ was organised by the Hume Centre for Ecology and Wildlife Biology in association with the Kerala council for Historic Research.
Presenting a paper on ‘Tribal agriculture systems, community food and nutrition security’, K.P. Smitha, Assistant Professor, College of Agriculture, Vellayani, Thiruvananthapuram, said there was a high diversity of edible crops among Adivasi communities, but many of them were fading now. “Unless we highlight the value of such knowledge and food systems among communities themselves, their nutrition security will be in peril,” she said
Food security and nutrition security are different. Rice supplied through the public distribution system cannot ensure nutrition security for poor people as it can only satisfy hunger, Dr. Smitha observed.
Bharathan P. Ashok, a researcher from the Irula community of Attappady, presented a paper on how the hostel education system alienated the younger generation of tribal communities in Attappady from their inherited traditional knowledge and food production systems.
“The new generation is ignorant about food diversity,” Mr. Ashok said, adding that though deaths of babies in Attapady were popularly termed as “hunger deaths”, they were not due to lack of food, but lack of nutrition.
Chairing the session, S. Gregory, anthropologist and former dean, Kannur University, said there was a concept that tribals were the most backward when it came to lifestyle. However, such a thought showed the inability of mainstream society to understand the value of their life and lifestyle, he added.
