Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
agricultural experiments continue on today: in 2010 the LDF government
rolled out a “pepper revival package” for the district through agricultural
extension and the KVK, to boost pepper production and the competitive-
ness of Wayanad's crops in international markets.33
Many of the beneiciaries of these programs are new setlers in the re-
gion. Promised land from the nascent Kerala government in return for
converting Wayanad's “wastelands” into productive fields (the same rhet-
oric British colonialists had used), hundreds of setlers migrated to the
area from southern Kerala. As I noted in chapter 5, many migrants were
from the state's Syrian Christian communities in the Travancore region,
who were historically denied land ownership and government jobs be-
cause of strict caste hierarchies. However, they had accumulated some
wealth in other occupations, such as banking and trading, and their cap-
ital accumulation facilitated their purchase of cheap land in rural areas
such as Wayanad, especially after the state's land reforms made more land
available and eliminated caste discrimination.34 As traders, these Syrian
Christian communities chose to grow cash crops such as pepper and
other spices.35 Hence these new farmers came to specialize in non-rice
agriculture and to dominate export agriculture in Kerala, particularly in
newly setled areas such as Wayanad.36 Today about a quarter of the dis-
trict's population is comprised of Syrian Christians.37 The majority of
farmers who are certified organic for export in the district are also from
these Syrian Christian groups.38
In the late twentieth century, Wayanad entered into the international
environmental spotlight after the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and Con-
servation International demarcated the district and nearby areas as the
Western Ghats Biodiversity Hotspot, because of its numerous varieties of
endemic species. In response, the state and national governments created
thirteen wildlife sanctuaries and five national parks in Kerala, to protect
and showcase this flora and fauna. The state government enthusiastically
absorbed this imaginary of Kerala as fecund and Edenic by launching a
tourism campaign that calls the state “God's Own Country.”
International environmental organizations have argued that the West-
ern Ghats are in dire need of additional, immediate intervention, because
human
activities — especially
agriculture — threaten
its
biodiversity.
