Traditional Maize Storage Methods of Mayan Farmers in Yucatan, Mexico: Implications for Seed Selection and Crop Diversity

Moreno, Luis Latournerie; Tuxill, J.; Moo, Elaine Yupit; Reyes, Luis Arias; Alejo, Jairo Cristóbal; Jarvis, D. I.

doi:10.1007/s10531-004-6679-0

Cited by 50 publications

(26 citation statements)

References 10 publications

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“…Several previous case studies at the community level in Mexico (Perales et al, 2000;Perales et al, 2005;Latournerie-Moreno et al, 2006;Brush and Perales, 2007;Bellón and Hellin, 2011;Tuxill et al, 2010) and elsewhere (Brush, 2004;Guzman et al, 2005;Bisht et al, 2007;Rana et al, 2007;Jarvis et al, 2008;Bezançon et al, 2009;FAO, 2010;Jackson et al, 2010;Mulumba et al, 2012;Zimmerer, 2013) have demonstrated the persistence of landraces for climatic, ecological, cultural or social reasons. This trend is reaffirmed by the data from Mexico's national effort for maize diversity recollection (CONABIO, 2014).…”

Section: Longitudinal Analysis On Maize Varieties In Yucatan 57mentioning

confidence: 96%

“…Soil taxonomy and land quality affect both the distribution of maize varieties across the landscape and the probability of farmers' adoption of improved varieties (Latournerie et al, 2006;Bellón and Taylor, 1993). Agriculture in the state of Yucatan has been shaped by significant environmental constraints, including the predominance of shallow stony soils, periodic shortfalls of rainfall during the growing season and the risk of major disturbance from cyclones (Duch, 1991).…”

Section: Longitudinal Analysis On Maize Varieties In Yucatan 57mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Longitudinal analysis of maize diversity in Yucatan, Mexico: influence of agro-ecological factors on landraces conservation and modern variety introduction

Fenzi

Jarvis

Reyes

et al. 2015

Plant Genet. Resour.

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Transformations that farmers bring to their traditional farming systems and their impacts on the conservation and evolution of maize varieties over a 12-year period are investigated using a longitudinal analysis. Despite the increased introduction and supply of improved maize variety seeds in the Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico, over the last 12 years farmers continue to maintain a substantial amount of traditional maize variety diversity. Even with the increased availability of hybrid seeds, farmers in the community of Yaxcaba on average plant more than three quarters of their milpa fields to traditional maize varieties, with the latter one fourth predominately planted to a locally improved variety Nal Xoy, a farm cross of a traditional variety and an improved variety. We observed a significant reduction in yellow -x-Nuuk nal, a long-cycle traditional landrace, paralleled by an increase in short-and intermediate-cycle locally adapted improved maize varieties. We found great differences in the distribution of maize varieties by soil type, with modern varieties being targeted for the rarer, deeper and fine-grained soils, while traditional varieties predominate on the more prevalent stony and thin soils. Our results provide a picture in which most traditional maize varieties in Yaxcaba continue to be maintained by farmers, coexisting with locally adapted improved varieties on the same landscape, and allowing the continued evolution of maize populations.

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Section: Longitudinal Analysis On Maize Varieties In Yucatan 57mentioning

confidence: 96%

Section: Longitudinal Analysis On Maize Varieties In Yucatan 57mentioning

confidence: 99%

Longitudinal analysis of maize diversity in Yucatan, Mexico: influence of agro-ecological factors on landraces conservation and modern variety introduction

Fenzi

Jarvis

Reyes

et al. 2015

Plant Genet. Resour.

Self Cite

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“…The four groups recorded in the northern Benin were discriminated by the germination parameters (precocity, cobs maturity) and variables related to the plants heights and ear insertion (Salami et al, 2015b). Thus, the quantitative traits should not be neglected by the conservatives when studying the diversity because these parameters are essential in peasant environments where they greatly influence the phenotypic selection criteria (Moreno et al, 2006;N'da et al, 2014a).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Agro-morphological variability of Zea mays (L.) accessions collected in Southern Benin

Salami¹,

Sina²,

Wallis³

et al. 2017

J. Plant Breed. Crop Sci.

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“…Anastasi et al [54] mention the earliness of sesame landraces as a useful trait in semiarid environments, because it shortens the cropping cycle, reduces water use and makes the field available sooner for the next crop. Moreno et al (2006) [38] analyzed how different landraces and modern varieties affect crop storability for small-scale farmers in México and found that they have more problems with pest infestation in case of modern varieties than landraces. One third of farmers does not report high levels of storage losses to insects when using their local landraces, and do not see the need to implement pest control measures.…”

Section: Cultivation Effort and Crop Storabilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

More than Yield: Ecosystem Services of Traditional versus Modern Crop Varieties Revisited

et al. 2018

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Agricultural intensification with modern plant breeding focuses on few high-yielding crops and varieties. The loss of traditional crop species and variety diversity contributes to the current decline of provisioning, regulating, and cultural ecosystem services, as reported in the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment. Access to local and adapted varieties is pivotal for resilient agroecosystems, in particular under current global change. We reviewed the scientific literature to understand the role of different crop varieties for ecosystem services, comparing the performance and perception of traditional landraces versus modern varieties and ask the following questions: 1. Do landraces and modern varieties differ in terms of provisioning and regulating ecosystem services? 2. When and why do farmers prefer cultural ecosystem services of landraces over high-yielding varieties? Based on 41 publications, our results document that modern varieties are preferred over landraces because of their typically higher provisioning services such as crop yield. However, landraces often guarantee higher provisioning services under non-optimal farming conditions. Landraces can show high resilience under harsh environmental conditions and are a trusted source achieving stable crop yield (e.g., under droughts stress). Regulating services such as resistance against pests and diseases appear to often become lost during breeding for high-yielding, modern varieties. Furthermore, small-scale farmers typically prefer local landraces due to regional cultural features such as family traditions and cooking characteristics for special dishes. In conclusion, both landraces and modern varieties have merit depending on the farmers' priorities and the social-ecological context. In any case, maintaining and restoring the huge diversity of landrace varieties is necessary for sustaining current and future needs.

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Traditional Maize Storage Methods of Mayan Farmers in Yucatan, Mexico: Implications for Seed Selection and Crop Diversity

Cited by 50 publications

References 10 publications

Longitudinal analysis of maize diversity in Yucatan, Mexico: influence of agro-ecological factors on landraces conservation and modern variety introduction

Longitudinal analysis of maize diversity in Yucatan, Mexico: influence of agro-ecological factors on landraces conservation and modern variety introduction

Agro-morphological variability of Zea mays (L.) accessions collected in Southern Benin

More than Yield: Ecosystem Services of Traditional versus Modern Crop Varieties Revisited

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