La milpa en Yucatán, desde una perspectiva del buen vivir

Abstract

This article seeks to understand the actions strengthening the milpa crop growing system in Mayan communities in eastern Yucatan by the Strategic Project for Food Security (SPFS), associating such activities with the concept of the good life. Toward this end, this study begins with a description of the importance of agro-diversity present in the milpa for nutrition, followed by an exposition of the nature of the socio-demographic, environmental and milpera production characteristics of the indigenous communities and peasants of eastern Yucatan. Subsequently, the purpose and effectiveness of the implementation of the SPFS in Mayan communities are highlighted. The second part of the essay is a defense of conventional development and the good life, seeing milpera production not as a matter of romantic attachment to the rural way of life, but a strategy of national sovereignty within the current context of global food crisis. We conclude that the milpero system is a sustainable option for agricultural production that not only represents a way of life linked to indigenous and peasant communities, but one that can be economically viable, socially and environmentally relevant at a time when multiple crises converge upon our contemporary world.