Methods and tools

Decolonising action-research methodologies are important for reversing the loss of biocultural heritage and enhancing community wellbeing and collective action. Indigenous knowledge, concepts and research methods can contribute to formal research processes and a multiple evidence base approach.

Here you will find information and examples on:

• Decolonising action-research methodologies that link indigenous and participatory methods
• Biocultural community protocols for collective landscape governance and asserting rights
• Community biocultural register databases to protect traditional knowledge and data sovereignty
• Biocultural economies, products and services to generate income from biocultural heritage, and
• Equitable models for access and benefit-sharing for genetic resources and traditional knowledge.

Decolonising action-research methodologies privilege and revalue indigenous and traditional ways of knowing, concepts and research methods. They aim to promote self-determination, resist dominant discourses, undo colonial patterns of power that shape knowledge production, and revitalise marginalised traditional knowledge systems.

They centre indigenous expertise and leadership, and promote intergenerational transmission of traditional knowledge, values and worldviews.

Decolonising methodologies are key for establishing collectively governed biocultural territories and building strong community institutions and capacity to protect biocultural heritage and related rights. The Potato Park in Peru, an emblematic biocultural territory which has delivered multiple impacts for biodiversity, climate resilience, livelihoods, food and nutrition, based on a thriving traditional knowledge system, owes its success and self-sustainability to a 20-year decolonising action-research process.

The Potato Park’s decolonising methodology

The Potato Park has developed decolonising action-research methods and tools, with support of the indigenous NGO Asociacion ANDES. The approach includes the following key elements:

• Indigenous conceptual frameworks: all research is guided by the Andean ‘Ayllu’ concept, where the world is divided into the human, the wild and the sacred worlds, which have to be in balance to achieve holistic wellbeing. This provides the overall goal and the framework for structuring research and the epistemic principles to guide research (for example relationality, reciprocity, balance with nature). Any external concepts are re-interpreted using indigenous concepts. For example, the Andean Chakana Cross provided the conceptual framework for the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment sub-global assessment in the Vilcanota Spiritual Park (PDF).
   
• Indigenous expertise and leadership: research is conducted by indigenous community members with expertise in traditional knowledge, who are elected by indigenous authorities. The indigenous experts are accountable to community authorities rather than external projects.
  
  Projects are designed by indigenous researchers, with support from ANDES. Research addresses community needs, and ideally the idea for the research comes from the community. In the Potato Park, research is facilitated by at least two community researchers or ‘tecnicos locales’ from each community, who are paid as researchers, supporting employment. The Potato Guardians group brings together ‘tecnicos locales’ from five  communities, establishing a network of experts who provide technical support for the Potato Park, and for scaling out the model to other communities. Free, prior and informed consent of community assemblies is a critical first step in any externally initiated research, allowing the community to deny consent or place conditions.
   
• Indigenous methods and tools: priority is given to Indigenous Peoples’ own research methods and tools including indigenous naming and classification systems, for example for native potato varieties. Quechua methods include transect walks where elders transmit knowledge to youth,  Yupana for matrix ranking, and Kipus for recording information using knots on string.
  
  Priority is given to oral and visual tools, such as storytelling and video. ANDES has supported the use of digital tools for indigenous-led research in the Potato Park and Barter-Maize Park, to  engage youth and reinforce oral traditions.  For example, a smartphone app was developed to record elders’ knowledge of wild plants, photos and geographic information system (GIS) data through transects, and feed the data straight into a secure community database.
  
  Traditional knowledge is also linked with western science. For example, the Potato Park has worked with scientists to assess the impacts of climate change on native potatoes through a multiple evidence base approach that maintains the integrity of both knowledge systems.

Biocultural protocols (or biocultural community protocols) are a key tool that communities can develop to:

1. Assert their customary rights over biocultural heritage in the face of external threats, and
2. Agree rules for collective self-governance of biocultural territories and equitable benefit sharing among communities.

They set out community rights and responsibilities under customary, state and international law. They can  establish procedures for free prior and informed consent, and strengthen community negotiating capacity to promote more equitable  agreements with third parties.

The Convention on Biological Diversity’s Nagoya Protocol (2010) recognises the need to support the development of community protocols by Indigenous Peoples and local communities to govern access and benefit-sharing for traditional knowledge associated with genetic resources.

Biocultural protocols are also tools for self-governance of biocultural territories - inter-village or inter-community agreements that set out Indigenous or traditional holistic wellbeing goals, cultural and spiritual values and customary laws for collective governance.

They can also guide equitable benefit-sharing among communities - for example, the sharing  of revenues generated from collectively held biocultural products and services, to prevent potential conflicts due to uneven benefit distribution.

Kuna protocol for research on biodiversity in indigenous territories

The Kuna people in Panama developed a biocultural protocol to regulate access to biodiversity on their territory, protect their intellectual rights over traditional knowledge and ensure equitable benefit-sharing.

The Kuna people in Panama developed a biocultural protocol to regulate access to biodiversity on their territory, protect their intellectual rights over traditional knowledge and ensure equitable benefit-sharing.

The protocol sets out the procedure for obtaining prior informed consent and the information the community requires. A proposal needs to be submitted to the Kuna General Congress, assessed by a technical committee and discussed with the authorities of the 49 Kuna communities. If approved, permission has to be obtained from the community and the knowledge holder, who can also allow or deny access.

Using the biocultural heritage concept has helped the Kuna develop a protocol based on the community’s vision. Kuna customary law principles of equilibrium, reciprocity and solidarity have guided the protocol since these are the basis for all Kuna social cohesion. The Kuna have sought recognition of their protocol as part of the national law on intellectual property protection for indigenous cultural expressions (Law 20).

Potato Park inter-community agreement for equitable benefit-sharing

The five Quechua communities of the Andean Potato Park in Peru adopted a biocultural protocol in the form of an inter-community agreement in 2009. It sets out customary laws to guide equitable benefit-sharing among communities from the use of collectively held biocultural heritage. It aims to prevent conflicts that could arise from uneven distribution of revenues and resources.

The inter-community agreement has guided the distribution of native potato varieties repatriated through an agreement with the International Potato Centre. It also guides benefit sharing from various economic collectives in the park, which are obliged to contribute 10% of revenues derived from biocultural products or services that use the Potato Park logo to a communal fund.

The revenues are distributed among the communities at the end of each year in accordance with three key  Andean customary law principles: reciprocity, duality and equilibrium, with nature and in society.  The communities are rewarded according to the level of participation in Potato Park activities and economic collectives.

The funds are used to support the economic collectives and a park administrator, and provide a safety net for people in need, such as widows and orphans.

The inter-community agreement also sets out the objectives of the Potato Park (Sumaq Kawsay) and customary laws for collective governance of the Potato Park; and the rights and responsibilities of Quechua communities and conditions of membership of the Potato Park. It reaffirms the collective rights of the Potato Park communities to their biocultural heritage.

The agreement was developed through an in-depth community research and dialogue process over 2-3 years, with support from Asociacion ANDES and IIED. The process strengthened inter-community cohesion, institutions and decision-making capacity, and customary laws. The agreement underpins the park’s biocultural economy, where income generation reinforces cultural values that underpin biocultural heritage, rather than weakening them.  

Bushbuckbridge healers’ resource access protocol, South Africa

This biocultural protocol was developed by 80 healers (PDF) from two different language groups to secure access to medicinal plants. They set up the Bushbuckbridge Traditional Healers organisation.

The protocol set out their values and roles in conservation and primary healthcare provision, and explained the threats to their livelihoods due to limited access to medicinal plants and overharvesting by others. It also appealed to the authorities for access to conservation areas.

As a result of the protocol, and with support from the NGO Natural Justice and UNESCO, the healers were granted access to an area in the Bushbuckbridge Nature Reserve, a UNESCO biosphere reserve, to set up a medicinal plant nursery. The protocol also sets out requirements for prior informed consent for access to the healers’ knowledge.
 

Community biocultural registers provide a tool for communities to record their biodiversity, traditional knowledge and biocultural heritage and assert community rights and control over the data.

Argumedo and Pimbert (2006) define an indigenous biocultural heritage register as: “a database into which Indigenous Peoples put information regarding key components of their indigenous biocultural heritage – particularly those resources threatened by biopiracy – in order to gain legal rights relating to that information”.

Community registers are for community use, so communities themselves design and conduct the documentation and control the knowledge. They can help communities to:

• Protect their rights over traditional knowledge and biodiversity by maintaining control over data and contesting intellectual property claims
• Reverse the loss of traditional knowledge through knowledge sharing, inter-generational  transmission and enhanced use, and
  Identify useful plant resources for sustainable use, and improve monitoring and conservation of biodiversity.
• Computer database registers can store video clips and photos, to support transmission of orally held knowledge. Multimedia databases can make the process of information gathering and recording highly participatory. Digital information can be protected through software which restricts access.

The Potato Park community biocultural database (Peru)

The Potato Park communities created a database of potato varieties and related traditional knowledge to hold the information collected by communities through action research, based on the Andean principles of reciprocity, duality and equilibrium.

The database used free (open source) software to administer data entry, access and use, in line with customary practices of free and open sharing of knowledge. GIS technology and audiovisual equipment was used to record resources and knowledge.

The community evaluated resources identified for registration using a Yapana matrix tool, which establishes the specific uses of the resource (medicinal, food and ceremonial) and determines the level of protection needed.

External access was regulated by a three-level security system. ‘Green’ denotes information accessible to anyone, provided the rights of Quechua peoples over the traditional knowledge and resources are fully recognised and benefits from their use are shared; ‘Yellow’ means access is conditional on receiving prior informed consent; ‘Red’ information is not accessible to external third parties, but only to select Quechua individuals. The register did not store sacred or secret knowledge.

Assisted by the NGO Asociacion ANDES, the Potato Park communities entered their database into the Multilateral Systems (MLS) of the FAO Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture. The MLS is a global access and benefit-sharing system for crops important for food security and breeding.

This was the first time a community collection has entered the MLS, recognising the important role of communities and landscapes in genetic resource conservation.

The rights of the Potato Park communities over their collection were already secured under their agreement with the International Potato Center, which also forms part of the MLS. But now the Potato Park is an independent part of the system which can allow the communities to participate in shaping the terms for access and benefit-sharing.

The Barter-Maize Park biocultural database (Peru)

Building on this experience, the Barter-Maize Park in Lares (Cusco region) has developed a biocultural database register of neglected and underutilised plants, with support from ANDES. Quechua elders and youth and western scientists conducted transects across the landscape and collected GIS data, traditional and scientific names and traditional uses, using audio-visual tools.

The data was collected using a specially designed smartphone application that transmits the information directly into a community database. The plants collected were ranked using an ancestral Yupana matrix, and some are being used to improve child nutrition and develop biocultural products.

Biocultural plant registers and community seed banks in Southwest China

China: Local maize varieties, Karst mountains
Community-based plant genetic resource collection and registration began in 2005 with a participatory action research program led by the Centre for Chinese Agricultural Policy in Southwest China. Following the establishment of the Farmers' Seed Network in 2013, the community biocultural register expanded to communities in North and even East China.

The community registers include traditional crops, wild medicinal plants and related traditional knowledge. A template designed by the Farmers' Seed Network and plant breeders, allows farmers to document basic information on agronomic traits, cultural significance, and local details like environmental conditions and farming practices. Farmer facilitators help compile this information into a portal database.

The register is crucial for establishing and managing community seed banks and supporting on-farm management and conservation of genetic diversity and related biocultural heritage. It also provides public access to information on local agrobiodiversity for farmers in other communities and others.

For instance, the community seed bank in Wangjinzhuang village, a dryland terrace and Globally Important Agricultural Heritage System (GIAHS) site in a mountainous area in north China, uses QR codes linked to information about each landrace displayed in the seed bank. The community seed banks typically have protocols in place to document the sources and flows of seeds and emphasise collective community ownership to protect their rights.

These activities have enhanced agrobiodiversity on farms and in home gardens and strengthened traditional knowledge systems. The registers help communities to educate younger generations and transmit traditional knowledge.

Biocultural economies generate income from unique products and services based on biodiversity and traditional knowledge, while conserving and regenerating biocultural heritage, and reaffirming non-monetary production and exchange systems.

Income generation is often important for the economic sustainability of biocultural territories and engaging youth. Non-monetary economies, such as subsistence production and barter, are often important for maintaining traditional knowledge and cultural values, and for food and nutrition security.

Market linkages need to be carefully designed so that private material accumulation does not replace the collective, sharing and spiritual values that underpin the maintenance of biocultural heritage, collective landscape stewardship and social as well as ecological resilience.  

Value addition by communities and short value chains or direct sale to consumers can maximise revenues while minimising pressure on biodiversity and enabling communities to maintain control over markets. Similarly, developing baskets of farm and landscape-based products and services (including sustainable use of wild plants, low-level ecotourism, for example), can minimise pressure on natural resources and generate income for different community members.

Labelling and certification can help communities communicate the biocultural value and territorial origin of their products and services to consumers. ‘Soft’ intellectual property rights tools such as collective trademarks and geographical indications can recognise collective rights over traditional-knowledge based products and their links to territory and culture.

But it is often difficult for communities to access formal labelling and certification schemes, due to administrative and financial hurdles. IIED and partners have been exploring the development of an alternative biocultural heritage indication and labelling scheme for products and services that contribute to conserving and regenerating biocultural heritage.

Linking farmers to restaurants and consumers in southwest China

In Guangxi province, the Centre for Agricultural Policy and Farmers’ Seed Network have linked farmers to organic restaurants in local cities and towns to support farmers growing local varieties, working with the local NGO ‘Farmers’ Friend’. The project set up several contracts between  farmers from different villages and organic restaurants that specialise in traditional varieties. The supportive pricing mechanism encourages farmers to maintain traditional varieties (such as rice, maize, vegetables and the Guangxi chicken) and builds farmer and consumer confidence in local varieties and traditional knowledge.

Building on this experience, the Farmers' Seed Network launched a 'Seed to Table' initiative. This initiative enables farmers to generate income from local landrace varieties and traditional specialty foods. Farmers in Guangxi province established a cooperative for organic vegetable production and sale in local markets.

In Yunnan province, farmers in the Naxi Stone Village and two Moso villages that form part of the biocultural heritage network are sustainably developing traditional varieties and speciality products, leveraging their intangible cultural heritage to enhance value and public awareness. Farmers are collaborating with small, local e-commerce platforms to promote and sell their traditional agricultural and handicraft products, and some are also using social media platforms to increase visibility and sales.

In North China, within the GIAHS dryland areas of Inner Mongolia and Hebei province, farmers practice agroecology, conserving local seeds and organizing seed and food fairs. These fairs, supported by organic farmers' markets and consumer groups, increase visibility and market access. Attractive product packaging further enhance their marketability. These initiatives also use farmer participatory guarantee systems for certification.

Biocultural economy, products and services in the Potato Park, Peru

The communities of the Andean Potato Park near Cusco, with support from Asociacion ANDES, have developed a number of biocultural products and services, managed by local economic collectives, mainly women.

They produce packaged herbal teas, creams and potato shampoo, and traditional textiles, and have established gastronomy, agro-ecotourism and tourist guide groups that employ young people. This has doubled household incomes mainly from visitors to the park (for educational tourism, homestay, trekking) but also local product sales (for example to hotels in Cusco).  

These economic collectives bring together members from different communities to reaffirm collective values and traditional knowledge. They use a Potato Park logo, designed by the communities, which certifies origin and reaffirms collective identity. The Potato Park’s inter-community agreement requires that 10% of the sale of any product or service carrying this logo (an informal trademark) goes into a communal fund.

The funds are distributed at the end of each year in accordance with customary laws: the communities that contribute the most to the park activities and economic collectives get the most benefits. The fund also provides a safety net for people in need (such as widows and orphans).

The park is also developing a community seed enterprise that can supply resilient seeds to neighbouring communities. Rather than maximising profits, the enterprise aims to cover the costs of the Potato Guardian’s group and maintaining the community seed bank.

Deep purple and red potato varieties that grow at high altitudes are rich in anti-oxidants and provide an opportunity to generate income from ‘nutraceuticals’. Farming is agroecological and ritualistic and largely for subsistence rather than for the market. ANDES is supporting efforts to revitalise barter exchanges in the Potato Park and with other communities.

Micro-enterprise groups in Rabai Biocultural Territory, coastal Kenya

In the Mijikenda community of Rabai, a sacred Kaya forest landscape, 10 villages are establishing a collectively governed biocultural territory inspired by the Potato Park in Peru, with support from IIED, the Kenya Forestry Research Institute and the UK Darwin Initiative.

The community has established five biocultural micro-enterprise groups largely composed of women and youth: beekeeping and honey, coconut oil, palm brooms, briquette-making from farm waste (such as coconut husks), and a Cultural Village for eco-tourism. Products are packaged and labelled with a Rabai Biocultural Territory label.

These groups have enhanced incomes sustainably,  helped to reduce pressure on Kaya forests, and strengthened women’s involvement in decision-making. The community has also developed an  inter-village agreement for collective governance and equitable benefit-sharing, so that a percentage of the revenues generated from biocultural products goes into a communal fund to support the biocultural territory and provide a safety net for the very poor.

There is potential to further develop ecotourism, given the proximity to Mombasa and coastal hotels, and since two of Rabai’s Kaya forests are World Heritage Sites. Indigenous vegetables also offer a potential opportunity for enhancing income.

The Nagoya Protocol on access to genetic resources and benefit-sharing (ABS), requires equitable sharing of benefits derived from the use of genetic resources held by indigenous and local communities and associated traditional knowledge.

But access and benefit-sharing has generally entailed a flow of genetic material from communities to users, or the use of previously collected genetic resources and traditional knowledge, and has generated few benefits for communities.

Equitable ABS models allow communities to also gain access to genetic resources, protect their intellectual rights and get monetary benefits. These reverse or reciprocal access agreements can restore native varieties that have been lost and provide direct benefits for climate resilience, food security, livelihoods and cultural revival.

They can also support equitable research between communities and scientists linking traditional knowledge and science - for example, to monitor climate change impacts on crops, or develop more resilient varieties through participatory plant breeding - while enhancing the genetic basis for plant breeding by agricultural institutes.

Reverse ABS: the Potato Park and International Potato Centre repatriation agreement, Peru

In the high Andes, Quechua communities depend heavily on the diversity of potatoes for nutrition and resilient farming, such as varieties with frost, drought or pest tolerance. But the Potato Park communities had lost a number of native varieties due to genetic erosion and unsupportive policies.

In December 2004, the Association of Potato Park communities (representing the six communities) and the International Potato Center in Lima (CIP) signed an agreement on the Repatriation, Restoration and Monitoring of Agro-biodiversity of Native Potatoes and Associated Community Knowledge Systems. Over 400 disease free native potato varieties, collected from the Potato Park in the 1960s and 70s, were returned and the International Potato Center agreed to provide a share of the monetary benefits from their past use.

This landmark agreement establishes an equitable model of access and benefit-sharing which reflects the customary principle of reciprocity (equal exchange). It is also a significant step in the protection of community rights – the International Potato Center (CIP) also agreed not to allow any intellectual property rights on the varieties from the park, effectively ‘repatriating’ them.

The agreement aims to strengthen agrobiodiversity in the park for nutrition and food security, through collaborative research. Potato Park experts and CIP scientists have conducted equitable research to monitor climate change impacts on repatriated potatoes, linking traditional knowledge and science.

The repatriated potatoes have brought direct benefits for nutrition and climate resilience, new livelihood opportunities and enhanced tourism interest, by establishing an exceptionally diverse genetic reserve. Potato repatriation also brought back indigenous knowledge and beliefs embedded in native varieties and maintained in the memory of elders, and fostered a sense of collective custodianship responsibility.

Following the success of this agreement, the Potato Park signed a follow-on agreement with CIP in December 2010, and deposited its entire seed collection directly into the Svalbard Seed Vault in Norway, for safe-keeping.

The agreement enabled CIP to directly benefit communities and help address challenges of agrobiodiversity loss, climate change, food security and livelihoods, while also expanding its gene bank. This reverse or reciprocal access model could also be used by botanic gardens to improve in situ conservation of medicinal plants for community health security.

Participatory plant breeding and equitable ABS in China

Participatory plant breeding aims to breed resilient new or improved crop varieties that are adapted to diverse local conditions. Breeders and farmers jointly make decisions throughout the process. Farmers contribute knowledge and seeds, hence the benefits must be shared equitably.

Two decades of participatory plant breeding (PPB) in China, facilitated by the Centre for Chinese Agricultural Policy and the Farmers’ Seed Network, has empowered farmers, improved local varieties, developed new varieties that are more resilient than modern hybrids, and broadened access to seeds for both farmers and formal breeders. PPB has also enhanced recognition of the importance of local landraces and traditional knowledge, and has prevented the weakening of provisions to protect farmers’ rights in national law.

PPB’s multiple benefits for food security, crop diversity and local economies have supported diverse groups, including farmers, breeders, NGO facilitators, and value chain stakeholders. To ensure long-term sustainability and equitable partnerships, formal or informal ABS agreements are needed to prioritise and guarantee benefits for farmers and communities.

Equitable ABS related to plant genetic resource conservation and PPB operates under three frameworks within the Farmers' Seed Network:  community-based protocols and seed sharing principles outlined in community seed bank charters; codes of conduct for farmer-to-farmer seed exchange  in seed fairs and farmers’ markets; and equitable ABS agreements governing farmer exchange of seeds and knowledge with gene banks and plant breeders.

This structure supports the network's national, regional (southwest, north and east China), and local networks, which facilitate seed and biocultural knowledge exchange.

The community seed banks operate under local rules incorporating biocultural protocols based on biocultural registration. These protocols recognise farmers' collective ownership of seeds and traditional knowledge, underpinning benefit-sharing in seed exchange and marketing. Farmer-to-farmer seed exchange within the network is facilitated by seed fairs at various levels organised by community seed banks and partners. These seed fairs generally operate under a code of conduct emphasising open access, equality and transparency.

Equitable ABS agreements with local research institutes were pioneered by communities in Guangxi in 2010.  Two types of benefit-sharing agreement were established. The first is for the conservation of local landraces for future breeding, recognising that these are the product of farmers’ knowledge. The second recognises farmers’ contributions of genetic resources and knowledge to the participatory breeding process.

With Farmers' Seed Network support, farmer-shared maize and soybean varieties were conserved in a gene bank for equitable sharing among farmers and public breeders in accordance with ABS agreements. This ABS model has expanded to other provinces, including Yunnan, Jiangsu, Hebei, and Inner Mongolia, fostering equitable farmer-gene bank partnerships.