I haven't posted for a while, with the excitement of Thanksgiving and fieldwork. The last few weeks since I got back from the US I went twice out to the field, and have almost finished doing all of the surveys (I'm up to 100!). I might even do more than I had planned, since I now have a third assistant (the girlfriend of my current assistant, who studies political science/sociology). I have been feeling like I am not doing enough "other work" (ie reading, writing) besides collecting data and a professor friend here told me that you're not supposed to write while collecting data because everything gets clouded by your first-hand experiences before analysis. That made me feel better. So I write notes instead.
The whole urban-rural dynamic is so interesting here. There seem to be various forces acting on the demise of agriculture, including the lack of government support, high prices for inputs, low prices for maize, urban growth, kids not working in agriculture/wanting to build a house on the land, the shrinking of land area because of dividing it up for the kids, and overall laziness to farm (a farmer told me yesterday that although a farm worker gets double the pay, young people would rather work in a factory for less). All directions point to household food production diminishing rapidly as it already has in the last 20 years. However, there are definite cases of kids being into farming, people valuing local corn production and hand-made tortillas, and continuing pride to take care of the land. I'd say these cases are around 15-20% of the households I survey. I've heard from other sources in the communities I work that 25% or 30% of kids of farmers are farming. I have heard various farmers speak passionately and thoughtfully about the value of land, of growing food... one man yesterday said "we are not owners of the land, she is the owner of us." Yet in most of these cases the kids are not engaged in agriculture. They are looking for a "better" life, have different interests, don't want to toil in the hot sun and earn nothing. But that thought is always followed by "but if we don't plant, what are we going to eat? If we lose our jobs and have land, at least we can eat, we can eat nopales and greens and corn and eggs." I have not interviewed or surveyed the young people, that would be REALLY interesting. Hopefully I can do that when I return from break.
This is all to say that there is a strong pull taking people away from food production. But I do believe that the desire to be close to the land is something innate, and if it goes away it comes back because it continues to exist in the corners and shadows. Maybe it's reformatted or in different packaging, but the human connection to land will never be extinguished. At least I hope not.
The whole urban-rural dynamic is so interesting here. There seem to be various forces acting on the demise of agriculture, including the lack of government support, high prices for inputs, low prices for maize, urban growth, kids not working in agriculture/wanting to build a house on the land, the shrinking of land area because of dividing it up for the kids, and overall laziness to farm (a farmer told me yesterday that although a farm worker gets double the pay, young people would rather work in a factory for less). All directions point to household food production diminishing rapidly as it already has in the last 20 years. However, there are definite cases of kids being into farming, people valuing local corn production and hand-made tortillas, and continuing pride to take care of the land. I'd say these cases are around 15-20% of the households I survey. I've heard from other sources in the communities I work that 25% or 30% of kids of farmers are farming. I have heard various farmers speak passionately and thoughtfully about the value of land, of growing food... one man yesterday said "we are not owners of the land, she is the owner of us." Yet in most of these cases the kids are not engaged in agriculture. They are looking for a "better" life, have different interests, don't want to toil in the hot sun and earn nothing. But that thought is always followed by "but if we don't plant, what are we going to eat? If we lose our jobs and have land, at least we can eat, we can eat nopales and greens and corn and eggs." I have not interviewed or surveyed the young people, that would be REALLY interesting. Hopefully I can do that when I return from break.
This is all to say that there is a strong pull taking people away from food production. But I do believe that the desire to be close to the land is something innate, and if it goes away it comes back because it continues to exist in the corners and shadows. Maybe it's reformatted or in different packaging, but the human connection to land will never be extinguished. At least I hope not. 