Georgina Catacora-Vargas

• PhD in Agroecology
• Tenure Professor on Agroecology at Academic Peseant Unit Tiahuanacu - Bolivian Catholic University

There is a growing global interest in agroecology, yet agroecological transitions remain fraught with challenges. These include the need to reconfigure the productive and reproductive agrarian relations of unsustainable food systems and to rethink how we work with ecosystems. Using a political economy approach, we propose five key interrelated dime...

"Art as a pedagogical strategy in agroecology to generate transformative feelings" is a brief article that summarizes the experience of intergenerational dialogue, with a gender approach mediated by graphic synthesis, carried out with undergraduate students in the Northern Altiplano of Bolivia on family food dynamics. One of the conclusions is that...

Este artículo describe los aspectos relevantes de la Declaración de las Naciones Unidas sobre los Derechos de los Campesinos y de Otras Personas que Trabajan en Zonas Rurales (UNDROP), incluyendo su relación con la agroecología.

Este reporte analiza diez experiencias de América Latina utilizando el marco propuesto por IPBES para el cambio transformativo. Las experiencias descritas demuestran que los enfoques territorial, basado en los derechos humanos y transdisciplinario de la biodiversidad conducen a su conservación y al fortalecimiento de la sustentabilidad de las estra...

This report analyses ten grounded experiences from Latin America using the IPBES proposed governance framework for transformative change. The experiences described show that territorial, human-rights based and transdisciplinary approaches towards biodiversity lead to its conservation while strengthening the sustainability of local livelihoods.

Este reporte resume los hallazgos de una revisión de literatura sobre el manejo realizado por mujeres de los ecosistemas terrestres en los Andes. Esta revisión fue realizada con el propósito de caracterizar el conocimiento científico, incluyendo los vacíos, que guían las políticas públicas y la toma de decisiones con relación a los roles de las muj...

This report summarizes the findings of a literature review on women's management of terrestrial ecosystems in the Andes. This review was conducted with the purpose of characterizing the scientific knowledge, including gaps, that guide public policy and decision making regarding women's roles in the context of biodiversity and climate change.

Esta investigación se enfoca en la relación biocultural entre las variedades nativas de maíz y las mujeres campesinas del Valle Alto de Cochabamba, Bolivia. Su abordaje es testimonial a partir de la investigación participativa revalorizadora y elementos de la economía feminista con el fin de realizar una caracterización preliminar sobre: (i) la div...

This paper reflects on the rights of indigenous women to biodiversity conservation and sustainable use, and biodiversity as a fundamental medium for the realization of a myriad of women’s rights. In this, the role of agroecology is stressed, using the case of women from the Guaraní Indigenous Nation in the Department of Chuquisaca, Bolivia. The con...

Agroecología en femenino. Reflexiones a partir de nuestras experiencias, es una publicación conjunta de la Sociedad Científica Latinoamericana de Agroecología (SOCLA) y el Grupo de Trabajo “Mujeres, Agroecología y Economía Solidaria” de CLACSO. Coordinado por Gloria Patricia Zuluaga, Gerogina Catacora-Vargas y Emma Siliprandi, en él encontramos nar...

El feminismo y la agroecología han caminado por diferentes sendas, pero desde hace un par de décadas han venido coincidiendo en diálogos y prácticas interdisciplinarias, en algunos momentos con tensión y otros con consonancia y mayor cercanía. Por un lado, han entendido que la destrucción de la naturaleza evidencia el vínculo entre el capitalismo y...

"Aymara Llanque y co-autoras compilan y analizan la experiencia de mujeres rurales de Bolivia quienes realizan la producción y comercialización de base agroecológica. Su trabajo es esencialmente testimonial integrando los resultados de cinco diferentes estudios que cubren seis eco-regiones del país. Desde los elementos provistos por la sustentabili...

The Plurinational State of Bolivia shelters a large biological and cultural heritage. Maize landraces are one of the most paradigmatic expressions of this wealth with 77 documented maize racial complexes. They are distributed in all the departments of the country, occupying a wide range of ecosystems from 150 to 3,800 meters above sea level. This d...

This study characterizes agrobiodiversity’s contribution to food sovereignty through the comparison of agroecological, indigenous and agroindustrial farming systems in the Department of Santa Cruz, Bolivia. The study parameters include productivity, the percentage of the crops’ harvest destined for self-consumption, and the diversity of species pro...

The importance of socio-economic impacts (SEI) from the introduction and use of genetically modified (GM) crops is reflected in increasing efforts to include them in regulatory frameworks. Aiming to identify and understand the present knowledge on SEI of GM crops, we here report the findings from an extensive study of the published international sc...

Under the denomination of ‘pesticidovigilance’, Milner and Boyd (2017) suggests the need for post-marketing approval and long-term monitoring of agricultural pesticides, similar to the surveillance of pharmaceuticals. While we agree with the authors’ analysis and their suggestions, we disagree with the idea that pesticides are necessary to produce...

The history of agroecology in Bolivia is described as having a long and a short trajectory. The “long trajectory” refers to the agroecology-based indigenous agriculture practiced in both highlands and lowlands of the country. The “short trajectory” started in the 1970s and became consolidated with the institutionalization of agroecology through ini...

La soberanía alimentaria es una concepción integral y sistémica de implementación y análisis de las dinámicas productivo-alimentarias. Sus postulados se resumieron en diez parámetros con los que se analizaron cualitativamente tres sistemas alimentarios del Departamento de Santa Cruz en Bolivia: agroindustrial, indígena y agroecológico. El sistema a...

En esta semana hace 10 años, la revista científica Nature publicó el descubrimiento de genes transgénicos en variedades criollas de maíz en Oaxaca. Este hallazgo fue una alerta temprana sobre la propagación incontrolable de cultivos genéticamente modificados (GM) una vez introducidos en el medio ambiente.

Los impactos socio-económicos (positivos o negativos, previstos o imprevistos) son parte innata de la introducción y adopción de tecnologías. Esto apunta a la necesidad de incluir consideraciones socio-económicas en los procesos de regulación de los OGMs. Palabras clave: Consideraciones socio-económicas, organismos genéticamente modificados, Protoc...

Debido a su abordaje restringido, los actuales análisis de sustentabilidad de cultivos genéticamente modificados levantan preguntas sobre la cantidad y calidad de información que generan para los procesos de toma de decisiones. Comparando el dossier de evaluación de la soya Intacta RR2Pro (presentada a las autoridades del Brasil) con literatura des...

Agroecology in Bolivia founds its origin in the ancestral practices in the high and lowland indigenous farming areas, which applied the principles of ecological interactions in harmony with the communal socio-cultural dynamics.The process of institutionalization of agroecology started at the early 80s, first with technical experimentation activitie...

This report seeks to contribute to the operationalization of the concepts of “sustainable development”, “societal benefits” and “ethical justifiability” of the Norwegian Gene Technology Act. In order to achieve this, the report addresses the questions surrounding the sustainability of herbicide-tolerant crops identified by the Norwegian Biotechnolo...

La historia de la soya en el Cono Sur de las Américas se remonta a más de 100 años atrás. Sin embargo, ha sido en los últimos 40 años y particularmente en los últimos 20, que ha experimentado una rápida transformación y expansión a través de un modelo de agricultura industrializada. La Producción de Soya y el Uso Tierras. América del Sur es la reg...

The alternative agroecological vision for agriculture and food supply is not just theory. Local expertise and knowledge integrated with leading scientific research have demonstrated a capacity to increase yields sustainably, decrease polluting inputs, promote food security and improve livelihoods. - http://www.scidev.net/global/agriculture/opinion/...

The assessment of the impacts of growing genetically modified (GM) crops remains a major political and scientific challenge in Europe. Concerns have been raised by the evidence of adverse and unexpected environmental effects and differing opinions on the outcomes of environmental risk assessments (ERA). The current regulatory system is hampered by...

The inclusion of the socio-economic aspects in environmental decision-making has been practiced since the early seventies. The interactions between the environment and society, the growing demand for social responsibility and the pledge towards sustainable development are some of its drivers. However, in multilateral environmental agreements, parti...

Genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are one of the most widespread and controversial products of modern biotechnology. The changes introduced in organisms and their secondary effects in complex natural and anthropogenic systems have raised a series of concerns and uncertainties with regard to their safety and the production packages that they rel...

Ten years ago, the discovery of transgenes in Mexican maize sparked an international discussion on the use of GM crops in centers of origin and genetic diversity. Since then, the pertinent question is no longer if transgenes will contaminate Mexico´s maize landraces, but more importantly, what we might lose if this continues. Answering this require...