Nurturing Indigenous Women’s Scientific and Technical Knowledge in Response to Climate Change
Author: Tanya Wragg-Morris, SAEDI Consulting (Barbados) Inc.
Climate change is presenting us with new and pressing challenges and placing increasing strain on resources. These changes are forcing us to adjust to life with warmer climate and greater extremes in temperature that threaten our ecosystems — precious systems that have kept the balance and supported livelihoods for generations. These challenges require new ways of looking at how we have been living and require us to look to new solutions in this ever-evolving world. Modern and extractive resource-based economies have left an imbalanced planet that is now severely dysregulated, and which will require new ways of thinking and interacting with the world to move us toward greater equilibrium with our planet.
Fortunately, many of these so called ‘new’ solutions to climate change already exist and are in fact currently in practice. They exist in the wisdom of indigenous peoples around the world, who, for thousands of years, have practiced methods of harvesting resources strategically and sustainably and working with the Earth’s natural cycles as opposed to against them. While indigenous men also make unique contributions to their communities, it is women’s contributions that are most often overlooked or undervalued. They deserve special attention for the incredible ways in which they support climate mitigation and adaption, as noted by the UN’s Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in his most recent report despite the many challenges they face. In the face of these challenges, including discrimination, limited access to ancestral land, gender-based violence, and limited access to quality education and healthcare (United Nations, 2022), indigenous women maintain incredible and robust technical knowledge about their communities and environments. Indigenous women’s scientific knowledge can support us in climate resilience efforts by ways of food security, biodiversity, and by working with the Earth’s natural systems as they exist, among many other benefits.
Indigenous people currently protect 80% of what remains of the Earth’s biodiversity in their territories (CBD, 2023). Indigenous women hold extensive knowledge of wide varieties of species of flora and fauna, acquired through observation and the passing down of information between women and children through generations. This is partly attributed to their diverse roles as agricultural providers, caretakers, healers, and leaders in their communities (Women4Biodiversity, 2022). Due to these diverse roles, women are responsible for the majority of the biodiverse plant resources used in their communities for use as food, medicines, materials for crafts and construction, firework and other household materials (IWBN,2023).
In terms of supporting resilience to climate change, there are numerous benefits to biodiverse practices, particularly when it comes to agriculture management. Drought and the increased incidence of pests are just a few of the issues more likely to arise in a changing climate. Indigenous practices of maintaining biodiverse agricultural areas helps prevent pests from destroying entire areas or entire crop yields (Shiva, 1992). Indigenous women’s cultivation of biodiverse land areas improves soil restoration due to increased organic matter, which in addition to producing healthier crops, has the added benefit of contributing to carbon sequestration and water retention. All of these are vital in improving agricultural conditions threated by climate change (Catacora-Vargas, 2021). Promoting biodiversity also benefits by providing a contribution greater diversity of nutrients from food (Ibid) and providing a variety of medicines, for example, ginger root which is used to treat the common flu (IUCN, 2022).
While their voices and wisdom are largely unrecognized, and in extreme cases even silenced due to gender-based violence, awareness and support is growing through efforts from organizations like The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), which notes that “indigenous women, in particular, are full of untapped potential as stewards of natural resources and biodiversity” (United Nations, 2022). Partner forums such as the Indigenous Forum on Biodiversity and the Indigenous Women Biodiversity Network also provide support for women’s contributions to biodiversity and help to bring awareness to the vital and important roles they share in conservation (CBD,2023; IWBN, 2023).
Another significant benefit of indigenous women’s scientific and technical knowledge connected with biodiversity is the role it plays in food security — an essential factor in responding to climate change. Women’s planting and cultivation of diverse crop varieties, especially in the advent of severe weather events (droughts, floods etc.), are more likely to provide their communities with some food rather than having an entire harvest being destroyed (ABD, 2015). In indigenous communities in South Asia, it is women who are responsible for roughly 70% of the work required to sustain food production systems (IUCN, 2022), driven by their roles as seed custodians.
The important role of ‘seed custodianship’, for most indigenous peoples around the world, is primarily the responsibility of women (United Nations, 2022) who have held these knowledge sets and practices since time in memorial (Shiva, 1992). It is women who typically undertake seed selection, storage, and breeding (ABD, 2015). Women’s knowledge of seeds and plants intersects with their knowledge of forecasting, where, for example, in Northeast India, women use their knowledge to select and store the best seeds for upcoming seasons, predicting conditions for the forthcoming year and which crops will produce sufficient yields (IUCN, 2022). Women’s skills as seed custodians extend beyond selection to knowing requirements for germination, soil selection, microclimatic factors, companion planting (bio-symbiosis), and the nature of plant diseases, all critical elements in ensuring crop sustainability and food security (Shiva, 1992).
In tandem with their substantial contributions to biodiversity and food security, indigenous women’s values of working in harmony with the land and Earth’s natural cycles offers another key component in the response to climate change. For nearly all indigenous peoples, a belief exists that a direct connection to the land and responsibility to maintain this connection is essential (IWBN, 2023). In Belize and Guatemala, Maya Q’eqchi’ women and Kakchiquel, Kiche and Tzutujil women respectively, pass on their scientific observation of nature’s cycles, supporting their involvement in natural resource management, to their daughters and granddaughters (IUCN, 2022). This kind of women’s empirical knowledge of the natural world provides key insights that are typically not factored in by scientists developing climate policies and plans (United Nations, 2022).
In connection to agriculture, in nearly all indigenous cultures, agricultural practices are naturally aligned with the existing climate and changing seasons. In comparison, many high yield varieties of modern agricultural systems have ceased their connections with Earth’s climactic and seasonal cycles (Shiva, 1992). That fact is compounded with a reliance on mega-dams for irrigation which has further negative implications for our ecosystems (Bryce, 2022). In providing care for the land, women’s practice of taking only the specific parts of the plant needed for herbal medicine and leaving the rest to grow is in grave contrast to harvesting entire agricultural plots or clearcutting areas for resources. In Asia, the practice of rotational cultivation is common among indigenous peoples in mountain areas, which helps maintain the integrity of the land and ecosystems (United Nations, 2022). Carefully observing the Earth’s natural systems and working in harmony with the Earth in this manner is an essential element in slowing the climate crisis. In the Pacific, the International Solomon Islands Development Trust is working to help preserve and document indigenous knowledge and practices for prevention and methods to mitigate the impact of natural disasters (IUCN, 2022).
Due to the immense value they provide and they knowledge they hold, concerted measures are needed to protect and promote indigenous women’s scientific and technical knowledge in responding to climate change. Some recommendations include:
- Enabling community-led biodiversity conservation by recognizing and protecting indigenous women’s rights and access to land (Women4Biodiversity, 2022);
- Deepening understandings of indigenous practices that support food security and applying some of these in considered and meaningful ways that do not appropriate from indigenous peoples, but works in partnership with fair compensation;
- Shifting the discourse toward viewing indigenous women as agents of change and referencing indigenous knowledge as scientific and technical vs traditional to more accurately reflect its agency and dynamic nature based on observation (United Nations, 2022); and
- Supporting organizations helping to preserve and restore indigenous agricultural practices among generations, like the work being carried out by the Gaia Foundation.
By supporting and acknowledging the distinct knowledge of indigenous women, we can better respond to the challenges of climate change through measures that maintain biodiversity, promote food security and that work with the Earth, not against it. Doing so acknowledges this education and forms of education as gender-based assets, enhances rights and participation, strengthens gendered understanding of use of ecosystems and use in livelihoods and expands our appreciation of leadership and decision-making in new ways.
