This video interview/photo montage is a talk between myself and Moises Jimenez. Topics of discussion include an introduction to Bolivian agriculture, the life of a Bolivian farmer, the importance of crop rotation and agricultural biodiversity. Part I of II.
This video views best in full screen mode.
The mix of visuals with audio works well. Too bad that I can’t take it along as an MP3. Looking forward to the next episode.
Erlend
If you Install Real Player and you enable the download option you can download the program. Once downloaded you can use the convert option to convert to MP3.
PS You do not need to pay for Real Player.
That was a great podcast, Frank! Thank you for sharing it! I look forward to part two. Many bits of “elder wisdom” can be applied to our small urban garden here in Colorado.
Very clever Frank, thanks for subbing the Spanish audio, I would have caught only 10% of what Jimenez was saying otherwise. The photo-slideshow is a great way to make the program bi-lingual.
It was good to hear Jimenez speak at such length. I don’t know how complete a picture he painted of his local agriculture, economy, and infrastructure — but the photos and his short descriptions were well-done.
It was disappointing to see that his focus is heavily on mass market crops, even in rotation — onions? How much do onions pay? What are the expenses involved? Is this a sensible economy born of need or ingenuity, worth learning from — or is it a mostly senseless agriculture that exports fertility and draws capital investment away from this otherwise wonderful-looking place.
It strikes me as odd that people would migrate to Spain for a couple years in order to build up cash savings. Couldn’t the cost of the trip to a migrant worker destination be invested directly into local land instead? I suppose travel has value in its own right — get the young men out of town. I am curious to what extent lack of information and craft skill is driving this apparently annual-monoculture-oriented economy. Was there a larger base of knowledge and biological wealth in this region at some point in the past, and it is now ruined?
Many of the questions you raise are addressed in my Master’s thesis, which can be found at:
http://forest.mtu.edu/pcforestry/people/1999/aragona.pdf
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