Food Systems, Market, and Water (SAMA)

Our action

To answer these questions, Ucoopia (formerly Eclosio), Diaconia, and Slow Food, in collaboration with the McKnight Foundation, are carrying out the participatory action research project SAMA: Food Systems, Market, and Water. The aim is to deepen understanding of local food systems and promote Andean family farming, particularly agroecology, based on the communities and territories of the high Andes of the Cordillera Negra de Aija (Ancash, Peru). It allows for further research and advocacy on issues related to access to water and markets, involving peasant families, policy makers, and Peruvian academics more closely in agroecology and sustainable food systems, thus contributing to improving farmers’ livelihoods.

This project seeks to answer two main questions:

• In the face of climate change, how can we develop more sustainable water management for family farming, in and by communities?
• How can we improve access to markets for agroecological products?

Taking into account socio-territorial dynamics (in particular, the high mobility of rural youth) and promoting the co-construction of knowledge between rural communities and the academic world, this project aims to formulate recommendations for strategies that are useful both at the local level and for reflection at the national and global levels. These recommendations will subsequently enable the development of pilot actions on the themes of water and markets, which will be carried out with some 200 families in Aija. Awareness-raising and policy advocacy actions are also planned to bring about behavioral change and greater commitment from citizens and policymakers to water management, family farming, and local products.