“Now it is an Easy Life”: Women's Accounts of Cassava, Millets, and Labor in South India

Abstract

Although coarse grains are considered underused and abandoned crops in much of India, they have gained increasing attention as having the potential to improve food security and positively affect small farmers' incomes. These trends offer the opportunity to examine the specific ways that contemporary declines in coarse grains are understood at the local level; in particular, it is necessary to consider how women in specific locales and at specific times view agricultural transitions in terms of their impacts on everyday time demands. I examine the decline of millet varieties, in favor of cassava cultivation, in the Kolli Hills, Tamil Nadu, through the lens of the experiences and workloads of women. A close examination of attitudes toward millets, in terms of field labor and household work, provides insights into the possibilities for local‐level coarse grain projects.

Establishing Sustainable Food Production Communities of Practice: Nutrition Gardening and Pond Fish Farming in the Kolli Hills, India

“…India's enrollment in the global agri-food system has resulted in greater state support for export-oriented crops, the overuse of chemical fertilizers and irrigation to increase productivity, increasing debt among farmers, and higher domestic food prices, none of which has contributed to national food security or put more cash in the hands of the poor (Carolan, 2012;Hazell, 2009;Sen, 1974;Shiva, 2016b). Among the small-scale farmers of the Kolli Hills region of Tamil Nadu, where subsistence farming of traditional varieties of small millets with high protein and mineral content has been replaced by largescale production of less nutritious cassava, there is a high prevalence of iron, protein, and calcium deficiencies (Finnis, 2009).…”

Labour Migration and Gendered Agricultural Relations: The Feminization of Agriculture in the Ejidal Sector of Calakmul, Mexico

“…Furthermore, we should not be surprised that women themselves might prefer not to assume new labour responsibilities in the fields, if they have any other options. Research by Finnis (2009) in South India found that changes in cultivars selected by households at least in part reflected a preference among women for lightened workloads and new leisure time. Agricultural field work in Calakmul is particularly burdensome, and often perceived as dangerous due to snakes and other animals.…”

Just Eat Peas and Dance: Field Peas (Vigna unguiculata) and Food Security in the Ozark Highlands, U.S

“…I conclude with a discussion of strategies to ameliorate food insecurity in impoverished rural areas like the Ozark Highlands, highlighting the agronomic and nutritional characteristics of Ozark field pea varieties that make them sustainable and potentially quite important within this cultural, biophysical, and sociopolitical context. Traditional crops have become marginalized in other parts of the world through acculturation and modernization as outsiders or colonizers' dominant food systems displaced local cuisines (e.g., cassava and millet in parts of Africa), and as commercial production and export replaced concerns with local sustenance (Finnis 2009;Romanoff and Lynam 1992;Shava et al 2009). Upon more widespread and documented recognition of the marginalized traditional crops' superior adaptability and nutrient content, locally-driven and exogenous sustainable development projects have reestablished such locally-adapted, productive crops into subsistence food systems (Shava et al 2009).…”