Transiciones socioecológicas en la agricultura chilena: análisis de casos en la Agricultura Familiar Campesina (AFC) chilena

Zusammenfassung

For 500 years, Latin America has been a net supplier of raw materials to the Global North. However, since the mid-twentieth century, predominantly in the post-war context, the countries of the Global South received technological ¿aid¿ (i.e., supplied as were part of the Green Revolution) with the aim of increasing yields per surface unit, and thus face global food shortages. This process marked a turning point, signaling the beginning of an accelerated extractivism and/or agro-extractivism, which promoted monoculture, precipitating both the loss of biodiversity -including forests and planted species-, as well as a marked decline of biocultural memory, associated with communities and the territories in which farmers and producers live. In this context, research in the field of socio-ecological transitions acquires special relevance. By adopting a transdisciplinary approach, this type of research allows the incorporation of elements of analysis, discussion and work that lead to the development of proposals with agroecological principles and gender perspective together with peasant and indigenous communities in their own territories. This thesis is part of this field, with the general objective of revealing the depth and extent of local knowledge, as an expression of democratic heritage, whose biocultural memory allows not only to understand socio-ecological transitions, but also to support the design of endogenous development methods. Therefore, the following specific objectives were addressed: a) establish local knowledge as the basis of sustainability in the management of agroecosystems; b) propose local knowledge as an articulator of epistemic and methodological pluralism for the sustainable management of land and property resources; and c) (Re)value local knowledge as situated knowledge for the sustainable management of agroecological systems. The methodology of this research was characterized by a participatory exercise to rescue knowledge, using hermeneutic and empirical techniques, with which it sought to recover and value the biocultural memory of communities in six different territories throughout Chile. Within this exercise, the relevance of the biocultural heritage of the territories was considered, primarily as a basic element to initiate pertinent, situated, democratic socio-ecological transitions, respecting the cycles of nature and times, resources, and interests of each community. The results of the research are presented starting with a conceptual historical review of the field of study, and relevant background information to understand the context. These are followed by a set of articles, which are the product of this investigative process and integrate relevant discussions. Finally, it is paramount that research in the area of environmental and social sciences have a complete knowledge of socio-metabolic transitions, in order to address an environmentally clean, socially just, and economically viable transition of the agri-food system in Chile. This research is expected to contribute to this urgent need, highlighting strengths, potential obstacles to such transitions, and discuss possible ways forward.