(Un)Cultivating the Disease of Maize: Pellagra, Policy and Nutrition Practice in Lesotho, c.1933–1963

In 1907, colonial officials in Lesotho first reported the nutritional deficiency disease pellagra. After drought in 1933, cases increased. The number rose through the 1940s, continuing upwards to 1963 before declining. Colonial research and policies in these decades failed to mitigate pellagra and malnutrition, but Basotho underwent profound changes in how they understood nutrition and how they acted to improve it. It is argued that these are two parts of a single story. One is a tale of colonial injustice, scientific hubris and failed policy that cultivated pellagra. The other is a narrative of people trying to uncultivate pellagra by engaging with old and new knowledge and technology to struggle against economic, ecological and political challenges. To reconstruct this two-part story, this article examines how this epidemic occurred, how knowledge about pellagra was produced and used in policy and how those policies contributed to changes in local practices. Furthermore, this work emphasises how agricultural and nutritional policies, even when informed by scientific research, ultimately fail if they do not address the political and economic injustices that leave people poor and vulnerable to disease.