Migration
Later in the week Jack Corbett, a professor at Portland State University, lectured us about migration in Mexico. One striking aspect of the conversation was questioning why people migrate. In most cases Mexicans don’t want to migrate to the United States to enjoy our way of life, but there are few jobs in their communities of origin. Often times, it is U.S. economic policy that causes such dire economic situations. When the U.S. sells cheap corn (subsidized by taxpayers) on the Mexican market, it puts Mexican farmers out of work. Migration can have devastating effects on communities, where some have lost more than half of their populations. The issue is especially prevalent in Oaxaca, which is one of the poorest Mexican states. In Oaxaca, one of every seven pesos in circulation comes from remittances sent from the U.S.
Class with Gustavo this week centered on the topic of food, and more specifically, food scarcity. The question he presented to guide our conversation was “In spite of the highest agricultural yields in the history of the world, why are there still so many hungry people?” No doubt a loaded question, but we grabbed the bull by the horns and proceeded to have an extremely animated conversation. We began by exploring the rise of commodity-based agriculture during the Green Revolution, a system based on mechanization, specialization and the heavy use of petroleum-derived chemical inputs. We then explored the role that foreign aid has played in the spread of green revolution agriculture throughout the world and the effects, positive and negative, this system of food production has had on the global food system.
The conversation then transitioned to a more philosophical realm. We discussed the topic of food sovereignty and we were presented with the idea that our diets should not be defined by an economic system but rather by the needs of our bodies. For example, we explored the sensibility of the US consumption of meat. Close to 50% of the grain grown in the US is fed to animals and it takes 8 grams of grain protein to produce 1 gram of beef protein. This is an extremely inefficient system, yet it the dominant one in our country because it is very economically profitable.
We also explored the complicated topic of ethanol production for use in automobiles. Our government praises ethanol due to its ability to strengthen our economy and lessen our reliance on foreign oil. They don’t however publicize the fact it takes more fossil fuel energy to produce the same amount of energy in the form of ethanol. We learned that about 40% of the corn grown in the U.S. is used to produce ethanol. So essentially we are growing food, and instead of eating it, are feeding it to cars through a process that uses more energy than it produces.
While the microphone was held for the most part by the food systems students, at the end of class, everyone expressed that they had learned quite a bit.
Santa Ana del Valle
Friday was the day of our overnight trip to the Zapotec pueblo of Santa Ana del Valle, and after an exhausting and mentally challenging week of classes, we couldn’t wait to get out of the city for a night. Santa Ana is set at the base of the mountains, about 45 minutes southeast of Oaxaca in the central valley. The most common occupation of its residents is rug weaving, and it accounts for around 98% of the village economy.
The main purpose of the excursion was to learn more about the effects that migration has on communities, and Santa Ana was a perfect case study for this. The official population of the village is listed at around 4,000; however, at any point in the time the actual number of people residing within the village boundaries is closer to 2,000. This is due entirely to emigration to the United States.
Upon arrival we split up into our home stay groups and went to our respective homes for comida. After a delicious meal we returned to the town center for a tour of the village museum that was created in the mid-eighties, and has become a model for other pueblos throughout the Americas interested in preserving their history. Next, we traveled through the hard packed dirt roads until we reached one of the many weaving cooperatives that exist in Santa Ana. There we were witness to the incredibly labor intensive process of creating hand woven, naturally dyed rugs. They showed us how they produce all of the yarn and dyes completely from scratch. The amount of work that is put into each rug is truly inconceivable without seeing it first hand.
The next day we found ourselves at the home of the village healer, an elderly women who had been practicing her form of medicine for 25 years. We learned how she diagnoses illnesses (it involves rubbing an egg on the patients body and then cracking it and examining the yolk), her different treatment methods and she even performed a healing ceremony on two of us! It was quite an eye-opening experience.
