"If the soil has its flavour..." Peasant traditional knowledge as an Agroecological Transition mobylizer

Abstract

Peasant traditional knowledge remains on the basis of agroecological research, considering that within it we can find features of the ecological racionality for natural resource management that peasant societies have developed along the History. Recovery and updating of this knowledge is, in the current context of global ecological crisis, more necessary than never. Peasant traditional knowledge can play as well an aditional role in Agroecological Transition processes at local society level, linking both symbolic and material components of social change. Activating its materiality -traditional seeds and tools or knowledge- we can boost subjective processes of change in the collective imaginarium, necessary to activate dynamics of endogenous, social change to sustainability.

To assess the potential of peasant traditional knowledge as mobylizer of Agroecological Transition we have developed a case-study in a peri-urban town in central Spain, with an ancient agrarian tradition but very affected by de-agrarization processes. In this study we have made diverse activities for the recovery of traditional knowledge, and then we have used this information as feed-back for debate with local population in open events which we have called agroecological analyzer-mobylizer. In this paper we try to assess the potential of these actions for activate Agroecological Transition.