Healthy soil and sustainable growing

["Tradingpost" <tradingpost@lobo.net>]

This Land Is My Teacher: Preserving Native #Agriculture and Traditions, & 
tierra y libertad!  
http://www.otherworldsarepossible.org/other-worlds/birthing-justice-land-my-teacher-preserving-native-agriculture-and-traditions

Nayeli Guzman is a young Mexica woman who went to New Mexico to be part of 
the effort to restore traditional agriculture. Throughout the US, Native, 
Chicano, and other peoples are rejecting industrialized agriculture and are 
growing their own food instead, thereby reclaiming the health of their 
traditions, culture, bodies, and land. They are contributing to one of the 
largest movements in the US today: creating a sustainable food supply chain. 
Here, Nayeli talks of one such program at the Tesuque Indian Pueblo, where 
she and other farmers are using long-abandoned farmland to grow 
long-abandoned crops, building up seed libraries, and teaching others 
ecological methods for growing food.

Nayeli Guzman |New Mexico, USA


Photo by Clayton Brascoupe.

Damn, I should have brought my beans! I wanted to show you my collection. One 
of my favorites is called powami, a Hopi ceremonial bean. There’s a really 
beautiful one called Maine Yellow Eye, which is all white and right at the 
part where the bean sprouts, there’s a little yellow moon on there. There’s 
another one called Provider. When you put it against the sun, it looks like 
an oil spill from your car. Man, those beans are so beautiful.

We cooked some red Mexican beans for the harvest festival, and everyone loved 
them.

It’s always good to be able to give food. It’s the best, dude. We don’t think 
of what we’re producing in terms of money, but just in terms of health and 
food for our families.

Farming was in my prayers for a long time. This land is my teacher; it’s my 
altar. It’s at the heart of my culture. We’ve always done that. We’ve strayed 
so far from it that I feel we have to go back, no matter where we come from. 
I’m just being responsible to the struggles my ancestors went through. They 
fought for tierra y libertad, which means land and liberty. In fact, we’re 
still going through that struggle today, with our food and even our genes 
being colonized.

A goal of this program is for the Pueblo to become completely self-sustaining 
so that during the growing season, people don’t have to purchase what they 
can grow themselves. Another goal is to preserve the traditional way of life 
here. We need to keep the traditions alive. We need to preserve the seeds. We 
need to preserve the soil. We need to preserve the planet.

What we want to do next year at the Head Start is to have each kid have their 
own little garden. This year our program was too young to do that, but we 
were able to deliver pumpkins for Day of the Dead. The kids carved them´and 
gave them to us as gifts, like a little thank-you note. We want to have 
workers from the Tesuque farm program go in and help them maintain the 
gardens.

We are also working with the senior center, giving them food from the 
harvest. For our harvest festival we gave them squash, pumpkins, cucumbers, 
all kinds of things. We’re trying to stay connected with the elders and to 
keep them around as long as possible.

We sell food at the farmers’ market, and people on the Pueblo can order the 
food they want from the fields. Part of me feels like we should be giving the 
food away to the people because we’re growing it on their land. But if 
they’re able to work, they should be farming for themselves, at least having 
a little plot of corn.

A few have become inspired to go out there and do it themselves. And I’ve 
noticed a higher level of pride among the people about being Native and 
preserving their way of life.

I see this plan spreading to different communities, not just the reservations 
but all over the place. I see other communities coming over here and 
learning, and taking that back to their people and starting it up all over 
again. We see it happening on a global scale already. There are farmers 
meeting together from all over the world. We need to all work together as 
land-based people and not look at what color we are or where we come from, 
because the land is not like that. Creator is not exclusive, so there’s no 
reason we should be. They tell us, “The more biodiversity you have, the 
richer your soil is going to be.” It’s like that with people. The more 
different kinds of people you have, the more we’re going to be able to 
survive. That’s why we need everybody working together. We can’t 
compartmentalize ourselves. That’s what industrial agriculture does.

If people would only open their eyes and their ears and their hearts to 
living in community, everything would work so much smoother. It’s not a 
Native thing. Community is a human thing. It’s already in us, we just have to 
bring it back out. One person can grow corn, one person can grow something 
else, and they can share. That’s how people used to survive way back when.

What we’re doing is very simple. These ideas are not an alternative for us, 
they’re just a way of life. We’re just doing what Creator meant for us to do.

 Inspired? Here are a few suggestions for getting involved!

    Just Harvest USA bridges the healthy and local food movement with the 
farmworker rights movement. Join them 
(www.justharvestusa.org/getinvolved.html).
    Grassroots groups all over the US are forming food policy councils to 
strengthen food systems that meet local needs. Consider joining one near you, 
or starting your own (www.foodsecurity.org/FPC/council.html).
    The US Food Sovereignty Alliance brings together food justice initiatives 
to organize for domestic food sovereignty and link up with the global 
movement for food sovereignty. Consider having your organization join 
(www.usfoodsovereigntyalliance.org).
    Organize a local campaign to protect your community from corporate 
farming and other corporate takeovers of natural resources. The Community 
Environmental Legal Defense Fund runs the Democracy Schools to help you get 
started (www.celdf.org).
    Organize a plant or seed swap. Boycott corporate-owned seeds, especially 
those owned by the largest agro-corporations such as Monsanto and Syngenta. 
Get involved with campaigns against agro-giants; check out the Organic 
Consumers’ campaign against Monsanto 
(www.organicconsumers.org/monsanto/index.cfm).
    Sign up for the Community Food Security Coalition’s policy email list for 
monthly updates on federal policy that affects community food security. Check 
out their platform for the 2012 Farm Bill 
(www.foodsecurity.org/2012FarmBill.html).
    Encourage your or your child’s school to buy local and healthy food 
through farm-to-school programs.
    Organize with other parents or students to make it happen 
(www.farmtoschool.org).
    Share a garden space with your neighbors or friends. Share your harvest 
with those you love (and those you haven’t met yet!)

And check out the following resources and organizations:

    National Family Farm Coalition, www.nffc.net
    Food First, www.foodfirst.org
    Family Farm Defenders, www.familyfarmers.org
    Grassroots International, www.grassrootsonline.org
    Agricultural Missions, www.agriculturalmissions.org
    Fair Food Network, www.fairfoodnetwork.org
    The Institute for Local Self-Reliance, www.ilsr.org
     International Indian Treaty Council, The Right to Food, 
www.treatycouncil.org/new_page_5241.htm
    New Farm of the Rodale Institute, www.rodaleinstitute.org/new_farm
    Women, Food, and Agricultural Network, www.wfan.org
    White Earth Land Recovery and Native Harvest Online Catalog, 
www.welrp.org & www.nativeharvest.com
    Peter Rosset, Food Is Different (Zed Book, 2006)
    Vandana Shiva, Earth Democracy: Justice, Sustainability, and Peace (South 
End Press, 2005)