Promoting traditional foods for human and environmental health: lessons from agroecology and Indigenous communities in Ecuador

Abstract

Background The displacement of traditional dietary practices is associated with negative nutritional consequences for rural Indigenous people, who already face the brunt of both nutritional inadequacies and excesses. Traditional food (TF) consumption and production practices can improve nutritional security by mitigating disruptive dietary transitions, providing nutrients and improving agricultural resilience. Meanwhile, traditional agricultural practices regenerate biodiversity to support healthy ecosystems. In Ecuador, Indigenous people have inserted TF agricultural and dietary practices as central elements of the country’s agroecological farming movement. This study assesses factors that may promote TF practices in rural populations and explores the role of agroecology in strengthening such factors. Methods Mixed methods include a cross-sectional comparative survey of dietary, food acquisition, production and socioeconomic characteristics of agroecological farmers (n = 61) and neighboring reference farmers (n = 30) in Ecuador’s Imbabura province. Instruments include 24-h dietary recall and a food frequency questionnaire of indicator traditional foods. We triangulate results using eight focus group discussions with farmers’ associations. Results Compared to their neighbors, agroecological farmers produce and consume more TFs, and particularly underutilized TFs. Farm production diversity, reliance on non-market foods and agroecology participation act on a pathway in which TF production diversity predicts higher TF consumption diversity and ultimately TF consumption frequency. Age, income, market distance and education are not consistently associated with TF practices. Focus group discussions corroborate survey results and also identify affective (e.g. emotional) and commercial relationships in agroecological spaces as likely drivers of stronger TF practices. Conclusions Traditional food practices in the Ecuadorian highlands are not relics of old, poor and isolated populations but rather an established part of life for diverse rural people. However, many TFs are underutilized. Sustainable agriculture initiatives may improve TF practices by integrating TFs into production diversity increases and into consumption of own production. Agroecology may be particularly effective because it is a self-expanding global movement that not only promotes the agricultural practices that are associated with TF production, but also appears to intensify affective sentiments toward TFs and inserts TFs in commercial spaces. Understanding how to promote TFs is necessary in order to scale up their potential to strengthen nutritional health.

Nutritional Status and Associated Factors among Primary Schoolchildren from Pastoral Communities, Mieso-Mulu District, Sitti Zone, Somali Regional State, Eastern Ethiopia: Institution-Based Cross-Sectional Study

“…After adjusting for all candidate variables in the multivariable analysis, sex, site of waste disposal, bed net utilization, and intestinal parasitic infection remained statistically significant at a P value less than 0.05 (see Table 2 ). Accordingly, male children were 1.86 times [AOR = 1.86; 95% CI: 1.12, 3.09] more likely to be thin than their counterparts, which is consistent with other study results reported in Ethiopia [ 29 , 32 , 58 ]. Boys have less body fat and more muscle mass compared to girls; thus, they have a higher energy demand and burn more calories compared to girls.…”

“…On the other hand, the magnitude of thinness in this study was lower than study results in the Philippines (27.8%) [ 56 ]. Similarly, the magnitude observed in schoolchildren from pastoralist and agropastoralist communities (22.9%) [ 21 ], Fogera district (37.2%) [ 47 ], Bahir Dar district (26.7%) [ 57 ], and Meket district (37.5%) [ 58 ] was lower. This variation might be due to the differences in the availability of health education programs for schoolchildren.…”

Consumer Behaviour and Attitude towards the Purchase of Organic Products in Riobamba, Ecuador

“…Therefore, strengthening and promoting the purchase and consumption of organic products is a challenge, since marketing efforts to highlight their virtues are scarce [ 34 , 35 ]. In relation to this, the correspondence between organic products’ production and legal policies is still incipient, since legally the planting and harvesting processes are protected with greater emphasis on industrialization and not on the more-traditional processes that benefit organic family farming and their markets [ 36 , 37 ]; In other words, organic producers need to offer their products in closed markets or with certain limitations, and not all consumers are aware of the existence of these markets and products [ 38 , 39 ], and therefore, very little is known about the behaviour and attitude of consumers towards these products.…”

Loss of ancestral food practices and perception of its effect on children’s health among Inga indigenous grandmothers, Nariño, Colombia

“…As time passed, several factors have decreased the consumption of the communities' ancestral foods, which are foods that belong to a specific region and to the gastronomic heritage of that region, given the value that they contribute in terms of both preparation and consumption. For this reason, ancestral foods require knowledge and generate cultural identity [3,4]. Determinants of the loss of ancestral foods include the exhaustion of natural resources, the replacement of native crops by commercial ones, and changes in farming practices.…”