Maize production and food sovereignty in lake regions of Michoacan. Considerations for its strengthening

Abstract

During the neoliberal regime, food policy in Mexico focused on the paradigm of ensuring physical and economic access to safe and cheap food; However, the measures to meet this objective caused, among other things, a trade deficit in basic foods such as corn, orientation of production towards export crops, environmental and people’s health deterioration. In response to this problem, in the mid-1990s, the concept of food sovereignty gained strength. This paradigm contributed to making visible the problems faced by small family productive units and the importance of including in public policy actions that respect the diversity of cultivated seeds, traditional agricultural practices, the care of resources and the reproduction of culturally accepted foods. In this context, the objective of this work is to characterize corn production in three lake regions of Michoacán (Mexico) from the perspective of food sovereignty and, based on this, raise considerations for its strengthening. A comparative analysis was carried out on the approaches of the food sovereignty paradigm based on own information obtained through a survey applied to corn producers from three lake regions of the state of Michoacán. The results show the coexistence of diverse production systems ranging from traditional to intensive production in each region, with manifest experiences of food sovereignty in the Pátzcuaro region and silent in the Cuitzeo region.