Water Wheel March 2022: Indigenous Crops

Abstract

Why ‘forgotten’ foods are a key ingredient to food security So-called neglected and underutilised crops refer to those edible plants that were once popular within certain geographies and communities, but have been displaced by mainstream crops, explains Prof Tafadzwanashe Mabhaudhi, who has been studying these plants since 2008 when he started his Master’s on a WRCfunded project on their water use and tolerance to drought. Mabhaudhi, Co-Director of the Centre for Transformative Agriculture and Food Systems at the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN), refers to sorghum as an example. The crop is popular in some countries, he says, but underutilised in southern Africa relative to its potential and the levels it was used historically, before the introduction of maize. We are not alone. Nearly the entire global population relies on a relatively small handful of food choices, far removed from local biodiversity and traditions.

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