Preserving cultural heritage through the valorization of Cordillera heirloom rice in the Philippines

Abstract

For centuries, heirloom rice varieties have been grown on the terraces of the Cordillera Mountains of Luzon, Philippines, terroirs known for their significant historical, cultural, and aesthetic values. However, heritage heirloom rice farming is gradually being abandoned, mainly because of its lower productivity and the struggle of the sector to create a sustainable niche market for heirloom rice by branding its cultural, social, and nutritional values. We propose several demand-side intervention strategies for the valorization of heirloom rice. To support the development of a segmented marketing strategy for heritage farming, we provide evidence on urban consumers’ willingness to purchase heirloom rice. We interviewed 500 urban consumers from Metro Manila in July–August 2015, who placed a purchasing bid on a kilogram of heirloom rice. Consumers’ bids averaged PHP 72.61 kg−1 (USD 1.60 kg−1), which is less than half its current market price. This explains why heirloom rice struggles to gain market share in urban markets in the Philippines. Given this bid price, we estimate a potential market size of PHP 20.3 billion (USD 443 million) that could be created for heirloom rice and tapped into by heritage farmers. Findings further indicate that women, business owners, and consumers who buy packaged rice and eat pigmented rice are willing to pay more for heirloom rice. Finally, our evidence suggests that proper information framing will be necessary to create demand and support the valorization of heirloom rice to preserve cultural heritage and in situ biodiversity of rice landraces in the Philippines.

UK Consumers’ Preferences for Ethical Attributes of Floating Rice: Implications for Environmentally Friendly Agriculture in Vietnam

“…Global demand for rice is shifting toward higher-quality varieties [101]. In particular, the demand for traditional rice varieties (with special flavors and high-quality) is increasing in East Asia and Europe as tastes and preferences change and incomes increase [102,103]. Consumers in the UK, especially the elderly, are preparing and consuming rice more frequently [104,105].…”

“For More Diversity, Better Taste and My Own Health” Exploring Organic Consumers’ Purchasing Motives for Heirloom Vegetable Varieties

“…This result is also reflected in other studies [63,64]. Raised assumptions about health-promoting properties can be ascribed to a variety of internet blogs and publications in popular science (e.g., [65]) as well as to positive health messages for heirloom grain varieties (e.g., low gluten content) [8]. Existing studies from Portugal and Hungary show that traditional varieties are considered healthier and more tasteful than their modern counterparts.…”

“…To make the cultivation of endangered crops attractive for horticulturists, a valorisation strategy must be established. This includes creating a sufficient demand and a functioning value chain for these products [7,8].…”

“…We apply both types of motivation in the context of heirloom varieties. Examples for both motivational factors, which have been derived from the existing literature [8][9][10]28,29,33,54], are depicted in Table 1.…”

Food security and the cultural heritage missing link

“…Incidentally, the literature has been relatively mute about how cultural heritage can be leveraged to enhance and strengthen food security across the Global South. Previous efforts have largely examined cultural heritage within specific contexts such as sustainable ecological systems (e.g., Brabec and Chilton, 2015 ; Rotherham, 2015 ; Valkó et al, 2018 ; Griffiths et al, 2020 ), agritourism (e.g., LaPan and Barbieri, 2014 ), commodification and valorization (e.g., Glover and Stone, 2018 ; Bairagi et al, 2021 ), diets (e.g., Cuevas et al, 2017 ; Samaddar et al, 2020 ), and food preferences (e.g., Demont et al, 2017 ; Kapelari et al, 2020 ; Britwum and Demont, 2021a , b ; Nichols, 2022 ).…”