In the Tropics, traditional agricultural systems yield models for sustainable farming all over the world
Fertile raised beds gathered from swamp lands, soil-retention terraces built on steep slopes, multiple types of agriculture practiced in one village ... these are not the latest experiments of Western agroscientists, but indigenous farming practices found throughout settlements and small villages of the tropics, and now considered by many scientists as hotbeds of agricultural knowledge and experimentation in the field of biodiversity conservation.
Dr. Christine Padoch, Senior Curator in the Institute of Economic Botany at The New York Botanical Garden, is studying indigenous farming practices in several areas of the humid tropics, and specifically in the estuary zone of the Amazonian v" rzea Ë› floodplains periodically inundated by tidally-influenced, sediment-rich river waters Ë› to determine the most productive and sustainable farming systems for the region and recommend them to policymakers as models of biodiversity management for similar ecosystems around the world.
The fertile soils and abundant aquatic resources of the floodplains have sustained the highest Amazonian population densities since the pre-Columbian period. But the intensification of destructive resource exploitation over these last thirty years, which includes large-scale logging, commercial fishing, and water buffalo ranching, has begun to threaten the biodiversity and long-term productivity of the v" rzea.
With People, Land Management and Environmental Change (PLEC), a joint project of the United Nations University and the United Nations Environment Programme, Dr. Padoch is studying the land-management methods of the ribeirinhos, the residents of the v" rzea. Their farming practices represent a storehouse of valuable information for maintaining the productivity, resilience, and biodiversity of this distinctive ecosystem. Dr. Padoch's research focuses on flood-resistant crops, plant-disease management, and sustainable yield of fast-growing timber species. The project carries out an active program of training, monitoring, and testing of plots of selected cooperating households under the guidance of the communities' own experts.
Dr. Padoch is an Associate Scientific Coordinator with PLEC, an international collabor- ative program initiated in 1992 to achieve world food security while protecting global biodiversity.
Principal Investigator:
Dr. Christine Padoch, Senior Curator,
Institute of Economic Botany
Public Relations:
Annick Sullivan
718-817-8815
Research Highlights is a series of glimpses into the botanical research of NYBG scientists. (11/97)
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