ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews the history of how Indigenous Peoples’ management practices have generated enormous diversity in some of the world’s staple crops today, including rice, potato, sweet potato, cassava, maize and sago. The chapter discusses the interconnection between ecological and cultural selection of cultivars, varieties or landraces; knowledge of plant maturation and reproduction; and planting strategies of the landraces. It makes a case for social embeddedness of knowledge, highlights the need for dissemination and exchange of germplasm, and expresses a concern about the consequences of diversity loss due to farming intensification. In conclusion, it is argued that preservation of cultural memory alongside conservation of biodiversity is necessary so that the conservation of one can support the other.
