Argentine municipalities embrace agroecology
RGENTINA | YESTERDAT 10:15
A network of municipalities are reimagining an agricultural production model based on industrial inputs, encouraging a new relationship between farming, food and nature.
Jorgelina Hiba
JORGELINA HIBA
Diálogo Chino
The global climate crisis has made the debate about the ways food is produced and consumed around the world ever more urgent, with agribusiness at its centre. In response, agroecology – a method that replaces chemical pesticides with bio-inputs and genetically-modified seeds with organic equivalents – has expanded in countries such as Argentina.
In 2016, a group of agronomists, doctors and socio-environmental leaders created Argentina’s National Network of Agroecological Municipalities (Renama), encouraging more and more localities to adopt a production model that respects human health and the environment.
“Agroecology is not just a technique for producing food, but a way of understanding how human beings interact with nature,” said Eduardo Cerdá, one of the network’s founders and Argentina’s current national director of agroecology.
Although less than five years old, today Renama is already a network that spans 34 Argentine localities (plus one Uruguayan and one Spanish) and brings together 180 producers who work 100,000 hectares of land according to an agroecological paradigm. Some 85 technicians provide expert assistance.
More:
https://www.batimes.com.ar/news/argentina/argentine-municipalities-embrace-agroecology.phtml