The Agroecological Farmer’s Pathways from Agriculture to Nutrition: A Practice-Based Case from Ecuador’s Highlands

ABSTRACT

Agroecology is increasingly recognized as a sustainable production strategy that is appropriate for the rural poor. Meanwhile, agricultural initiatives have received much attention for their role in improving farmer nutrition, and three key pathways between agriculture and nutrition include consumption of own production, income and women’s empowerment. In this study based in Ecuador’s Imbabura province, we used qualitative methods to explore the practices of agroecological farmers with respect to these three key pathways. Results demonstrate the heterogeneity of lived experiences through which agroecology increases agricultural diversity and builds social and human capital to improve nutrition. We further identify barter as an under-explored means to nutrition outcomes, and we discuss the role of the complex rationales that mediate farmers’ performance on agriculture-for-nutrition pathways. Finally, our results illustrate agroecology’s potential to spread nutrition-promoting practices through endogenous farmers’ networks.

KEYWORDS:

• Agriculture
• diversity
• nutrition
• sustainable
• agroecology

Acknowledgements

The authors foremost extent deep gratitude to the people that shared their knowledge and opened up their homes to this research. We further thank our colleagues from the Ekomer research team and EkoRural Foundation, and especially Stephen Sherwood, who gave critical guidance throughout research. We also wish to gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the International Development Research Center and of the Fonds de Recherche de Québec en Santé.

Disclosure statement

The authors report no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Funding

This work was carried out by the EKOMER Research Consortium, with the aid of a grant from the International Development Research Centre, Ottawa, Canada. The views expressed herein do not necessarily represent those of IDRC or its Board of Governors. [Grant number CR-48490]; The first author is supported by the Fonds de Recherche du Québec en Santé [Grant number 262314].