Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
other structures, doing animal husbandry, repairing electronics and managing
home-based stores (FUNDECI, 2004). Consequently, when the invitations
were given to households to participate in the research, the men would pass
on the invitation to the women and it was usually the women who agreed to
participate.
The purpose of the mapping and interviews was to document the socio-
ecological networks used in UA and to make inventory histories of the patios.
The mapping process was carried out in a participatory manner where
participants identified the various plants and trees in their yards and mapped
them by sketching these spaces. The action of mapping was used to provide a
detailed chronology of the plants and trees, where at each plant or tree
mapped the participants would relay how the plants were obtained, their
purpose and use, as well as who is involved in their management. The
interviews complemented mapping by providing more detailed socio-economic
information of the household.
Focus groups were utilized to gather data on collective interests. A total of
50 participants were involved in three separate focus groups.
6
Two focus
groups were conducted at the beginning of one of FUNDECI's huertos
familiares (family gardening) workshop.
7
Topics discussed included the
importance of plants and trees in patios, the different ways in which people
produce and maintain their patios, and opinions regarding growing food in
patios, communities and cities in general. At the end of the project, the group
was involved in evaluating the FUNDECI project and this study.
Data analysis
All of the interviews, mapping and focus groups were tape-recorded; later
these were transcribed and analysed. Large visual data maps, which consisted
of large pieces of brown paper with charts outlining different categories, were
based on data (e.g. economic, social) from interviews. Information from the
participatory mapping exercises was analysed in a similar way, creating
different categories. The categories that emerged from the mapping process
formed the basis for describing socio-ecological networks (Table 11.1), which
were then used to further analyse the social and economic information from
the interviews. All data was disaggregated by gender as well as by plant type.
R
ESEARCH
F
INDINGS
Diversity and difference in patio plants
The patios in San Augusto have a large diversity of plants and trees. During
the mapping process, a total of 713 different plants were identified. While this
is not a complete inventory of all the plants and trees, the mapping provided a
good representation of what people's patios contain. Women, who constituted
the majority of the participants, mapped over five times more plants than
