The Situation for Quinoa and Its Production in Southern Bolivia: From Economic Success to Environmental Disaster

Abstract

In Bolivia, one of the world’s most important centres of plant domestication, there is growing awareness of the value of native Andean crops, both for domestic consumption and for market sale – notably the virtually boom‐like consumer demand for quinoa around the world. The southern altiplano of Bolivia, south of Oruro, relies almost purely on the production of quinoa and breeding of llamas, which have also been selected as the two commodities of priority to the government to increase the income of the country. Presently, however, quinoa is facing increasing problems in production, owing to its increasing export market and price. The flat areas around the salt desert of the southern altiplano, previously characterized by natural vegetation fed by the llamas, are being increasingly sown with quinoa, hence transformed into deserts, because intensive cultivation methods make the soil loose its fertility. Possible solutions to these problems will require extensive efforts in the south, in addition to various strategies, which also include other parts of the Bolivian altiplano and a strengthened focus on other Andean crops.

Quinoa Expansion in Peru and Its Implications for Land Use Management

“…To a large extent, the current knowledge is related to the studies carried out in Bolivia where the intensification of quinoa production raises concerns, on both soil degradation and the compromise of the socio-ecological bases of the agrosystem, in order to face the multiple challenges for resilience to climate change and food security [7][8][9][10]. For these reasons, it is possible to place the Peruvian case within this problematic considering the country has become the world's largest producer and exporter of quinoa since 2014, accounting for about 60% of the total production [11].…”

Calling for a reappraisal of the impact of quinoa expansion on agricultural sustainability in the Andean highlands

“…Using the same database, we found quinoa production in 2012 higher by a factor of 2.8 in Bolivia and 1.8 in Peru in comparison to the maximum levels of the 1960-1970 decade. It should be mentioned here that in the southern highlands of Bolivia quinoa did not encroach on native habitats as mentioned by Jacobsen (2011) andSmall (2013) but on agricultural pastures whose floristic composition has been modified by llama and sheep herding for centuries. Thus quinoa expansion in these highlands is not a case of an expanding agricultural frontier but rather a process of land use change within the agricultural space.…”

“…Recently published scientific papers add to these debates, warning against the pressure stemming from the agricultural intensification in the fragile Andean highlands (Jacobsen, 2011;Bazile, 2014), their wild biodiversity (Small, 2013(Small, , 2014, up to and including the equity and cultural identity of their local societies (Jacobsen, 2011;Ruiz et al, 2013).…”

“…A common assertion in this respect claims that, in Bolivia in particular, the elevated price of quinoa exports would have skewed the traditional local consumption towards export to wealthy countries in the Northern Hemisphere (United States, Canada, Europe, etc. ), supposedly depriving local populations of an invaluable food resource (Jacobsen, 2011;Small, 2013). This assertion is not only wrong because it ignores the processes of massive food donation and food westernization dating back to the 1960s, long before the quinoa boom (Laguna, 2011;Winkel et al, 2012;Kerssen, 2013), it also conveys a connotation of culpability supposed to weigh upon consumers of Andean quinoa in the importing countries.…”

Conservation and Use of Genetic Resources of Underutilized Crops in the Americas—A Continental Analysis

“…Market demand is likely one of the most powerful; increasing customer demand on national and international markets for specialty products from a number of minor crops may already be an important incentive for moving forward national level research and development (and to a certain extent conservation through use), becoming more powerful than any international instrument or funding scheme. Although markets have been quite extensively analyzed for their sometimes controversial effects leading to erosion of diversity and unequal participation [67,68], their potentially positive driving role in the conservation and sustainable use of PGRFA has also been recognized [69][70][71][72][73].…”