The Contribution of Traditional Agroecological Knowledge as a Digital Commons to Agroecological Transitions: The Case of the CONECT-e Platform

Laura Calvet-Mir,Daniel López-García,Antonio Perdomo-Molina,Petra Benyei,Manuel Pardo-De-Santayana,Victoria Reyes-García,Laura Aceituno-Mata,María Carrascosa-García

doi:10.3390/su10093214

Abstract

Traditional agroecological knowledge (TAeK) refers to the cumulative and evolving body of knowledge, practices, beliefs, institutions, and worldviews about the relationships between a society or cultural group and their agroecosystems. These knowledge systems contribute to maintaining environmental and culturally sensitive food systems and have been considered very relevant for agroecological transitions, or the processes of scaling-up and -out agroecology. However, TAeK’s erosion and enclosure threatens its use and reproduction, which in turn might affect TAeK’s potential contribution to agroecological transitions. Here, we explore how transforming TAeK, and particularly TAeK on landraces, into a digital commons can contribute to its maintenance and protection, and thus to agroecological transitions. We do so by analyzing the CONECT-e platform, an initiative for digitally storing and sharing TAeK in a participatory way. One year after being launched, CONECT-e has documented 452 geographically distinct landraces from 81 different species. The information shared in this platform is well-structured, clear, and reliable; it thus allows for the replication of the knowledge reported. Moreover, because CONECT-e makes the documented information freely available and protects it with a copyleft license, placing information in this platform could help one face landrace misappropriation issues. CONECT-e, or similar initiatives, could contribute to agroecological transitions via maintaining TAeK under the digital commons framework, making it accessible to all society and avoiding enclosure processes.

Highlights

Traditional Agroecological Knowledge (TAeK) refers to the cumulative and evolving body of knowledge, practices, beliefs, institutions, and worldviews about the relationships between a society or cultural group and their agroecosystems
We considered an entry as a crSeuasttaiionanbiolitfyc2o01n8t,e1n0,txoFfOaRnPyEEkRinRdE.VTIEhWe CONECT-e platform is linked to a database with tables c4oollfe1c5ting information on users’ profile, users’ activity, and content provided by users
Documenting and sharing Traditional agroecological knowledge (TAeK) can make widely accessible a body of knowledge developed over centuries in traditional small-scale agroecosystems, potentially contributing to agroecological transitions

Summary

Introduction

Traditional Agroecological Knowledge (TAeK) refers to the cumulative and evolving body of knowledge, practices, beliefs, institutions, and worldviews about the relationships between a society or cultural group and their agroecosystems (adapted from [1]). Examples of TAeK include practices and beliefs related to agroecosystem management [2,3], knowledge about landraces [4,5], or cosmovisions and institutions regulating the management of resources used in agriculture such as water [6]. TAeK systems encompass information about how to recognize and efficiently manage agricultural landscapes and elements of the agroecosystem in environmentally and culturally adapted ways [9,11]. As with other types of knowledge [13,14,15], TAeK has been traditionally managed as a common resource: a resource governed by a group of people who have self-developed rules to handle the social dilemmas derived from its collective use, i.e., situations in which there is a conflict between immediate individual self-interest and long-term collective interest [9]

Methods

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Discussion

Conclusion