Review: The Maya Forest Garden by Anabel Ford and Ronald Nigh

I recently had an opportunity to do some research on agroecology in Southern Mexico for my Political Ecologies of Food and Agriculture course and came across The Maya Forest Garden: Eight Millennia of Sustainable Cultivation of the Tropical Woodlands by Anabel Ford and Ronald Nigh. The book was published in 2015 and I was disappointed it wasn’t on my radar sooner. Ford and Nigh provide an extensively research foundation for the book. In my opinion, it could easily be considered one of the seminal works on indigenous Mayan agricultural systems.

The book examines the milpa system, an agricultural framework that has been used in Central America for (as the title states) millennia. The co-authors of the book have spent nearly the entirety of their careers studying the milpa system alongside the descendants of the ancient Maya. Ronald and Nigh dive deep into written and oral histories to catalog the evolution of the milpa and the its various contexts throughout time. From its heyday as the premiere agricultural system in Mesoamerica, sustaining hundreds of thousands of people in a diverse and stratified society, to its modern use among smallholder farmers as a reliable source of nutrients and income when Green Revolution farming strategies fail, the milpa system is properly enshrined as an example of sustainable, knowledge-based agriculture that has stood the test of time.

The milpa system is examined as an ideal system for resource management in the tropical woodlands. It is a rotational system that provides different crops and ecological services throughout its phases of development. Ronald and Nigh detail these phases as such:

1.      Initialization – (1-4 years) open, multi-cropped field that favors extensive sunlight and contains peppers, beans, and (most importantly) maize.

2.      Renewal – (4-12 years) long-lived perennial reforestation that produces shade and allows for sunlight. Traditional crops become accompanied by fruit trees and native species.

3.      Culmination – (>12 years) closed canopy that favors shade crops and encompasses a large diversity of crop and animal life as the land reverts back to its natural state.

The Milpa Cycle, The Maya Forest Garden by Anabel Ford and Ronald Nigh, pg. 46

Essentially, the “milpa cycle” is a farmer managed trajectory from forest to field and back again. In modern times, milpa agriculture has come under fire for its use of slash-and-burn techniques. While slash-and-burn, or swidden agriculture can potential be problematic in some instances, it is important to recognize it as a form of regeneration where it is applicable. Fire certainly has a place in modern smallholder agriculture and the Mayans have been using it as part of their holistic farming systems for generations. Much of the farmer managed natural regeneration that takes place would be impossible without the use of swidden agriculture. Still, many environmentalists have labeled these techniques as destructive and unsustainable. The book discusses the importance of examining these practices within their agroecological contexts at length.

The milpa system is incredibly adaptable and can be found from sea-level to highlands in Central America. Each successive stage of the milpa provides different types of agricultural production and ecological services. Staple food production is heavily focused in the first stage and is usually centered around the farmers house to increase the security of vital crops. Cycles become increasingly biodiverse and resemble “forest gardens” in their intermediate stages; agricultural biomes that provide supplemental nutrition, biological pest controls, and organic fertilizer to the crops gown within them and the central, staple-crop fields. The transitional stages between field and forest present avenues for biological and ecological feedback as the farm and the farmer become part of the environment in true agroecological fashion.

Ford and Nigh give go into more detail about milpa systems than any other source I have found. But the section I found most interesting concerned the milpas of the modern day and the place they hold in the political ecology of Southern Mexico. Milpas have persisted in use despite the advance of input-driven agriculture that has been dominating Mexican farming systems since the mid-twentieth century. As Green Revolution farming systems took hold, more and more smallholders were pushed into marginal land which could only be effectively cultivated using milpa systems. During the Mexican Debt Crisis of the 1950s, farmers who faced the collapse of their input-driven systems turned to milpa systems to produce food and income for their families. Milpa agriculture has existed as an agroecological safety net and has cushioned the worst blows that Green Revolution agriculture has dealt to Mexican smallholders.

Perhaps the most interesting description of crops grown under the milpa system is that they are “anticommodities”. The book uses this term to describe crops destined for local economies that would otherwise be commodified on an international market. Because most staple food production in milpas is destined for local markets and “hidden” economies, they cannot be properly incorporated into a globalized system of food supply. In this sense, Ford and Nigh frame milpa agriculture as not just an act of subsistence but of resistance. As commodified, market-based agriculture grows ever dominant, it is important to highlight systems that are outside its reach. I would certainly recommend this book to anyone interested in the history of farming systems, the Maya, or agroecology. It’s an incredibly detailed and insightful resource.

 The Maya Forest Garden: Eight Millennia of Sustainable Cultivation of the Tropical Woodlands by Anabel Ford and Ronald Nigh