Gardens of Stone and Salt: quinoa production and landscape in the South Andean Altiplano (Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia), during the Pre-columbian Times.

P. CRUZ ; R. JOFFRE; T. WINKEL

Lamai Gompa

Congreso; Transformations and resilience of mountain agroecosystems and agrobiodiversity across landscapes; 14th International Society of Ethnobiology Congress; 2014

International Society of Ethnobiology

Employing an interdisciplinary approach which combines archaeology, agronomy, ecology, and genetics, our research examines Pre-Hispanic quinoa production on the Southern Andean Highland plateau from the XIV to XVI centuries. Our investigations reveal an efficient Quinoa producing agricultural system, in many ways similar to gardening, that was capable of sustainably producing significant productive surpluses. The data we have obtained allows us to identify the essential factors that intervened in agricultural production in this arid mountain landscape, from logics of production and strategies of climatic risk reduction to the cultural landscapes and social dynamics and processes. Our research contributes to current debates over the economic, social and ecological sustainability of the traditional modes of agricultural production in regions of the world with extreme climatic conditions.