IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/agrhuv/v8y1991i1p59-66.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The indigenous knowledge of ecological processes among peasants in the People's Republic of China

Author

Listed:
  • Paul Chandler

Abstract

A decision-tree model of an indigenous forest management system centered around shamu (Cunninghamia lanceolata),an important timber species in China, was constructed from extensive interviews with peasants in two villages in Fujian Province, China. From this model additional interviews were conducted to elicit from these peasants their reasons for selecting among decision alternatives. Those reasons that were of an ecological nature were discussed in detail with the peasants to elicit indigenous interpretations of ecological processes in order to test an hypothesis that a strong analogy exists between traditional indigenous and scientific knowledge of ecological processes. Three cases are presented that test this hypothesis. These three cases concern the effect of intercrops on the growth of shamu,the relative merits of seedlings and root collar sprout cuttings for forest regeneration, and the effects of repeated plantings of shamuon soil chemistry. All three cases provide strong support for the research hypothesis and suggest that, even in the absence of a formalized scientific method, humans exercise mental processes typical of scientific thinking. This phenomenon is called proto-science. Copyright Kluwer Academic Publishers 1991

Suggested Citation

  • Paul Chandler, 1991. "The indigenous knowledge of ecological processes among peasants in the People's Republic of China," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 8(1), pages 59-66, December.
  • Handle: RePEc:spr:agrhuv:v:8:y:1991:i:1:p:59-66
    DOI: 10.1007/BF01579657
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/BF01579657
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/BF01579657?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Anonymous, 1957. "Food and Agriculture Organization," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 11(2), pages 385-387, April.
    2. Anonymous, 1957. "Food and Agriculture Organization," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 11(4), pages 674-675, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Ivan S. Adolwa & Stefan Schwarze & Imogen Bellwood-Howard & Nikolaus Schareika & Andreas Buerkert, 2017. "A comparative analysis of agricultural knowledge and innovation systems in Kenya and Ghana: sustainable agricultural intensification in the rural–urban interface," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 34(2), pages 453-472, June.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Martin Paul Jr. Tabe-Ojong & Ernest L. Molua, 2017. "Technical Efficiency of Smallholder Tomato Production in Semi-Urban Farms in Cameroon: A Stochastic Frontier Production Approach," Journal of Management and Sustainability, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 7(4), pages 27-35, December.
    2. Pulhin, Juan M., 2008. "Book Review: Voices from the Forests: Integrating Indigenous Knowledge into Sustainable Upland Farming," Asian Journal of Agriculture and Development, Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA), vol. 5(2), pages 1-3, December.
    3. Lisa Price, 2001. "Demystifying farmers' entomological and pest management knowledge: A methodology for assessing the impacts on knowledge from IPM-FFS and NES interventions," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 18(2), pages 153-176, June.
    4. Ismat Ara Begum & Mohammad Jahangir Alam & Jeroen Buysse & Aymen Frija & Guido Van Huylenbroeck, 2012. "Contract farmer and poultry farm efficiency in Bangladesh: a data envelopment analysis," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 44(28), pages 3737-3747, October.
    5. Lori Thrupp, 1989. "Legitimizing local knowledge: From displacement to empowerment for third world people," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 6(3), pages 13-24, June.
    6. Coyner, Mary S., 1963. "El Salvador -- Its Agriculture and Trade," Miscellaneous Publications 316489, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service.
    7. Sylvia, Lane & Benito, Carlos & Berninsone, Rosa Maria, 1981. "Food Consumption in Rural Egypt Bibliography," Working Papers 232848, University of California, Davis, Agricultural Development Systems: Egypt Project.
    8. Gilliland, Ted E. & Sanchirico, James N. & Taylor, J. Edward, 2016. "Tourism, Natural Resource Use and Livelihoods in Developing Countries: A Bioeconomic General Equilibrium Approach," 2016 Annual Meeting, July 31-August 2, Boston, Massachusetts 236214, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    9. Kevin St. Martin, 2005. "Mapping Economic Diversity in the First World: The Case of Fisheries," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 37(6), pages 959-979, June.
    10. World Bank, 2008. "Lao People's Democratic Republic : Policy, Market and Agriculture Transition in the Northern Uplands," World Bank Publications - Reports 7774, The World Bank Group.
    11. Houtsma, John J., 1970. "The Effects of Imports on United States Groundfish Prices," File Manuscripts, United States National Marine Fisheries Service, Economic Research Division, number 233635, January.
    12. Jurģis Šuba & Agrita Žunna & Guna Bagrade & Gundega Done & Mārtiņš Lūkins & Aivars Ornicāns & Digna Pilāte & Alda Stepanova & Jānis Ozoliņš, 2021. "Closer to Carrying Capacity: Analysis of the Internal Demographic Structure Associated with the Management and Density Dependence of a Controlled Wolf Population in Latvia," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(17), pages 1-16, August.
    13. repec:ags:ucdegw:232848 is not listed on IDEAS
    14. Van Meir, Lawrence W., 1969. "An Economic Analysis of Policy Alternatives for Managing the Goerges Bank Haddock Fishery," Working Papers 232951, United States Bureau of Commercial Fisheries, Division of Economic Research.
    15. Dudley Seers, 1964. "Normal Growth And Distortions Some Techniques Of Structuralanalysis," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 16(1), pages 78-104.
    16. Hecht, Susanna & Rajão, Raoni, 2020. "From “Green Hell” to “Amazonia Legal”: Land use models and the re-imagination of the rainforest as a new development frontier," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 96(C).
    17. Zilberman, David & Khanna, Madhu & Lipper, Leslie, 1996. "Economics of Sustainable Agriculture," 1996 Conference (40th), February 11-16, 1996, Melbourne, Australia 149658, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    18. Shankarappa Talawar & Robert Rhoades, 1998. "Scientific and local classification and management of soils," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 15(1), pages 3-14, March.
    19. Wolfram Dressler & Juan Pulhin, 2010. "The shifting ground of swidden agriculture on Palawan Island, the Philippines," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 27(4), pages 445-459, December.
    20. Terry L. Anderson & Ragnar Arnason & Gary D. Libecap, 2010. "Efficiency Advantages of Grandfathering in Rights-Based Fisheries Management," NBER Working Papers 16519, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    21. Warren, Cline, 1962. "The Agricultural Economy of the Sudan," Miscellaneous Publications 316326, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:agrhuv:v:8:y:1991:i:1:p:59-66. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.