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BELLON: My own interest has definitely been more on centres of diversity. In terms of diversity, there are at least two large issues here. One is socioeconomic, the aspect of food security and farmers' well-being. The other is genetic. In terms of this latter, we might ask about the relationship between farmer-held diversity and genetic diversity — whether there is a correlation or not and whether, for example, the centres of diversity are really more genetically-diverse than other centres.

A point I want to make is that we really have to link these two aspects, socioeconomic and genetic. You can have a very strong case for diversity just on socioeconomic grounds, without any genetic benefit whatsoever, or vice-versa. It would also be very difficult to try to implement in-situ conservation if there is no benefit to farmers.

SPERLING: Saskia [Oosterhout], you described waves of genetic loss in Zimbabwe, and we often associate these waves of loss with political events. In the everyday life of a farmer, might there also be waves of gain, through markets (border markets?) or immigration?

OOSTERHOUT: Yes, what I wanted to show right from the start is that this cross-border effect is continuous. So in the wetter areas near Mozambique there are these long-season varieties that are six to eight months; in the southern area you have varieties that can cope with an arid landscape; and then near Botswana and Namibia, there are the very short-season, quite low-yielding varieties, but very drought tolerant. And in the north by the Zambezi River, there are very interesting long-season varieties that are ratooned for up to four years.

Also when people cross for economic reasons to South Africa and Botswana, they always take grain with them, always. We have done these very interesting maps with people — "how far do you travel to get grain" — and the figures are absolutely astounding.

LOEVINSOHN: Have you noticed any waves of gain in the wake of the recent severe droughts in Zimbabwe and particularly in the uptake of the extremely short duration sorghum and millets that you were referring to?

OOSTERHOUT: Because Zimbabwe is keen to keep its image of the bread basket (and with a great deal of World Bank pressure), the moment there are problems, they bring in hybrid maize. This hybrid maize is in the drought relief packages even in the areas where only sorghum is grown. Not one aid parcel contains sorghum seed. Some sorghum seed has been coming from the States and South Africa, but the varieties are not well-adapted and farmers don't like them.

GHILDYAL: I want to comment on the Kerala rice situation [V. Santhakumar's presentation]. My discussions with the Government of India and the Ministry of Agriculture show that rice is going out of cultivation there. The Government of Kerala has banned the conversion of rice land into any other kind of land. While this had been banned by legislation, farmers are still trying to grow coconut in the place of rice. This staple crop of rice of Kerala is disappearing because of its non-profitability.

BELLON: I want to comment on this interesting point in terms of the mechanisms of genetic erosion. One mechanism is the complete change in land use, for example, the problem with upland rice, i.e., one crop is being lost to another. The other is the more classic process of genetic erosion whereby improved varieties are being substituted for landraces. These two processes pose different questions, methods and even conservation strategies.

SPERLING: Mr. Santhakumar, you made a very provoking point when you suggested that we should develop different in situ strategies for different economic groups of farmers: that is, for marginal farmers, there should be a different strategy, for small farmers and for big farmers — in the same area. Could you elaborate?

SANTHAKUMAR: The issues are different for different groups. For example, local cattle is almost a rare species in Kerala, but the very marginal farmers still depend on them — even though there are artificial insemination facilities and other facilities available in the region. When you consider the people's resource base, the use of these cattle makes sense.

In contrast, wealthier farmers go for mixed cultivation and often profitable investment. They are probably ready to take certain choices, make certain investments and even further improve their biodiversity resource base. So I think the resource constraints of farmers are very important in developing strategies which promote diversity.

MANDAL: I think Mr. Santhakumar mentioned the non-availability of seed material or planting material for small and marginal farmers. My question is whether we can train farmers and help them to develop their own seed, in an organized manner, from a small quantity of seed material — then they can help themselves. As for coconut, Kerala has some excellent trees and farmers could select seed from their own gardens. From one tree they can get about 50 good coconuts and out of those, at least five could be selected for nursery use. So there should not be a dearth of material as far as coconut is concerned.

SANTHAKUMAR: There are few seed problems with crops such as rubber, coconut or even paddy. But there are trees, for example, the Anjali variety which used to provide timber for house construction, whose numbers have fallen drastically. Another example is laurel which gave non-edible oil for lighting and certain non-fruit varieties of jackfruit. There has to be some sort of external intervention for planting these trees over larger areas. The Botanical Gardens Research Institute, the Forest Institute, the horticultural department could all help to train farmers.

Document(s) 14 de 38