Segment 1

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Global Oneness Project

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Knowing How to Nurture Ourselves

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Annadana Seed Bank, Auroville, India

STEPHAN FAYON

My name is Stephan. I work in environment since the last 12 years and specifically I'm related to an international organization [Kokopelli India] which is engaged in seed saving. We save all the ancient varieties of vegetables, pulses, millets, wheats, which are disappearing because of the modern trend of agriculture, which is toward hybrids and genetically modified organisms. So we get, from everywhere on the planet, all these ancient varieties, conserve them, grow them again, and make them again available in networks of farmers everywhere.

STEPHAN FAYON

So here is a seed bank, mainly for vegetables. So we have all sorts of tomatoes, of sugar beet, of corns, of all ancient varieties, traditional varieties. So we bring them here and then we screen them, we look at their yields, how they perform in these types of conditions, and then I'll select like six, seven, eight which become part of our collection; we try a different station in a different place in India, and then we bring them back to the farmers, basically. So this center, the whole place is run with solar, solar energy. We have a seed-drying area, where we extract and dry and ferment, when necessary, all sorts of seeds. Then we have the last space there where we put the seeds in packets. So this is where we conserve our seeds, make packets out of them, and start to send them from here to different places. So this year with the harvest, we may have about 30,000 to 40,000 seed packets that we're going to be able to send in India.

STEPHAN FAYON

For me, actually, my work before me are the seeds. Seeds are very symbolic anyway, in any civilization, in our talk; "seed," it's a symbolic word. But here we really work on the seed; it's not on the symbol but on the real thing. It's funny how we have forgotten the essentials nowadays. Because we get our food from the supermarket, we don't have to think about it. But it's crucial, because at the moment the farmers everywhere on the planet have lost their resources. The seeds are coming from companies far away. And if the truck doesn't bring them or if the department, you know ... they don't have seeds. And without seeds there is no agriculture. Without agriculture there is no civilization. So what we are trying to do is conserve all these seeds and send them back to people who can, who are feeding the environment so that they can preserve it and become independent.

STEPHAN FAYON

So, for me -- to get back to that really basic thing, which is knowing how to nurture ourselves, how to cultivate our land without poisoning it -- so, for me, this is building the future. Because that system is going to collapse sooner or later. Because the actual type of agriculture is based on hydrocarbon, no? With cars, with tractors, with fertilizer. So if that happens or if global warming happens, we are going to be in a situation where this thing that we have disregarded so far, food, because there is plenty of food in the supermarket, is going to be scarce, you know? And basically I think we're going to have to get down to that basic thing: knowing again how to nurture ourselves. So this is how I link this seed saving, organic agriculture, sustainable agriculture, sustainable living with our future. Because I'm afraid that within a certain number of years we're going to be faced by a really cruel reality.

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