Unearthing the cultural and material struggles over seed in Malawi (chapter 10)

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IDL-48638.pdf (930.27 KB)

Date

2010

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Volume Title

Publisher

Fernwood Publishing

Abstract

Food sovereignty is vital to Malawian farmers. Power relations, knowledge sharing and development are embedded in different ways in struggles over maize and groundnut seeds. The majority of Malawians are peasant farmers, growing maize as their staple crop and groundnuts and other crops for sale and consumption, relying on their own production for seed stock. The chapter traces how colonialism created a repressive and preferential system emphasizing export crops, discouraging cultivation of diversified peasant crops such as finger millet, and denigrating local peasant agricultural practice by stressing modernization through the use of fertilizer and hybrid seeds.

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Keywords

SEEDS, FOOD SOVEREIGNTY, FOOD SECURITY, COLONIALISM, NEOLIBERALIZATION, PEASANT MOVEMENTS, RURAL ECONOMY, AGROECOLOGY, LAND POLICY, PRIVATIZATION, BIODIVERSITY, MALAWI, SOUTH OF SAHARA

Citation

URI

http://hdl.handle.net/10625/48638

DOI

Collections

IDRC Research Results / Résultats de recherches du CRDI
2010-2019 / Années 2010-2019
Agricultural Transformation / Transformation agricole
Multi-stakeholder Participation / Participation de multiples intervenants
Research Results (Ecohealth) / Résultats de recherches (Écosanté)
Sub-Saharan Africa / Afrique subsaharienne