A
group of mestizo and Ember‡
farmers have convened at an organic demonstration farm in San Fernando, Centro
de Capacitaci—n de Agricultura Sostenible ÒSan FernandoÓ established through cooperative efforts of the
Government of Panama and a La
Agencia Espa–ola de Cooperaci—n
Internacional an NGO from Spain. Even though it is the middle of growing season, a very
labor-intensive period, these rural farmers have traveled from their farms to
attend a ten-day seminar for those involved in TechnoServeÕs two projects
situated in the Panama Canal watershed.
Both projects are related to reforestation and agroforestry, which
center on organic agricultural implementation strategies.
The
attendees have been having lunch in an adjacent room. A few have begun to gather again in the classroom for the
afternoon session, a number of mestizo campesinos already seated
while all the Ember‡ farmers are still lounging on the veranda outside the
room. The campesinos are making jokes about the Ember‡ and their
stupidity. Everyone is laughing,
including the Panamanian tecnicos
from the demonstration farm and from TechnoServe. Their jokes focus on one Ember‡ man in particular, Chamu,
who lives in the Ember‡ village, La Bonga. Through TechnoServe, USAID paid him, along with others
enrolled in AIDÕs CLASP program, nearly $2,000. (approximately ten times the average annual income of an
Ember‡ man), to go to the US for two months to take a course in tropical
agriculture at an learning center located in the desert of Arizona. Chamu remains on program salary as the
in-town representative for TechnoServe in La Bonga.
Soon
the Ember‡ enter the room and the seminar begins again. The topic turns to the raising and
slaughtering of pigs. Immediately,
Chamu asks a question about the timing of slaughter. ÒIsnÕt this something that we should do during the new
moon?Ó All the campesinos in the room laugh at this. Then the Panamanian campesino instructor who works at the demonstration farm says
to Chamu, ÒOf course not. Look,
what we are teaching here is science! The truth is that you can slaughter a
pig at any time, the phase of the moon is inconsequential.Ó Chamu puts his hand down and does not
ask another question during the rest of the seminar (Fieldnotes of 10.28.98).
Within
two months, I am sitting in a three-day seminar at the Fundaci—n Proni–os de
DariŽn agroecology demonstration farm owned and run by two mestizos and several local Ember‡ tecnicos. The farm is no more than a four-hour
trip for each participant, a mix of campesinos, Kuna (indigenous) and Ember‡
(indigenous). The seminar, geared
towards principles of agroecology, is for those who have decided to enter into
a seed and animal lending contract with Proni–os. As if by some sort of magic of ethnographic inquiry, at the
point in the seminar focused on slaughtering pigs, an Ember‡ man asks, ÒIsnÕt
this something we should do only during the new moon?Ó The instructor, Pipong, an Ember‡ tecnico from a village in the region answers, ÒWe are trying
to establish which practices work.
That is something we are doing by trying different things, things we
have been doing for many years, and new things we are learning from talking to
other farmers using other systems.
We want you to tell us what is working well for youÓ (Fieldnotes of
1.13.99)
Later
it was Chamu who told me that TechnoServe was withholding coffee seeds from the
Ember‡ in La Bonga because the technicians didnÕt like the reforestation work
the Ember‡ had accomplished. ÒThey
think we are lazy.Ó When I asked
him if he remembered the response to his question about the pig, he smiled and
said, ÒYes, I remember it very well.Ó
He then asked me if I could help him find other NGOs for the people of
La Bonga to work with in lieu of TechnoServe. When travelling to several campesino villages in the watershed with TechnoServe tecnico Luis Pinto, he mentioned to me that TechnoServe had
had a terrible time getting viable coffee seeds this year and so had not been
able to deliver all the seeds they had promised. I recognized that even though the lack of seed was
legitimate, based on his experience, Chamu assumed the worst of TechnoServe
when they failed to deliver the promised coffee seed supply (Fieldnotes of
2.2-4.99).
NGOs
constitute one of the primary groups of actors implementing environmental
development projects in Panama, as elsewhere. There is a standard discourse that NGOs are well positioned
to impact the growth of civil society, based on the supposed inherent nature of
NGOs of altruism and political liberalism which leads them to be inherently
more responsible and accountable.
The assumption is that NGOs are vital conduits to democracy for the
rural poor and for government agencies spearheading rural development. They are the expert implementers, with
the local know-how to carry out the work of development and democracy
building. They are better able to
read the pulse of the people and to speak their language. In fact, the discourse suggests, based
on the assistance of NGOs, it is within the rural ranks in developing countries
that the greatest potential for the development of civil society lies.
In
reality, political, economic and social conditions often constrain NGOs in
whatever potential they do have for responding to the needs of the rural poor,
peasants and lower classes. In
this age of participatory development ideals, liberal development discourse
suggests that NGOs are more accountable to the public as well as more attuned
to local needs and local ways of being and doing. At the same time, international and national GO and NGOs are
increasingly employing other NGOs as project implementers, particularly as
states are downsized and former state responsibilities are farmed out to NGOs
and private enterprises. This often
ties NGOs to larger organizations in powerful economic alliances, effectively
undercutting the influence that NGOs might have to build participatory
alliances amongst other organizations.
Creating
a similar problematic, the notion that civil society can be grown by
concentrating on the rural poor contradicts the competing discourse that civil
society must be grounded in diversity.
For entrenched power structures to be challenged and changed without
armed revolution, a slow process of change necessitates the coming together of
a wide variety of class interests and the leveraging power inherent to
them. The rural poor, while
featured prominently in the advertisements of NGOs and international aid
organizations alike as the primary ingredients for civil participatory action,
are only one facet vital to the restructuring of conditions that lead to
environmental degradation and political disenfranchisement. If NGOs are to be players in this
restructuring, their impact on a variety of national and international subjects
is necessary. In this context,
economic relations must be overtly linked to political relations and
environmental action.
The
need for widespread impact combined with the difficulties inherent in
mobilizing diverse agendas, capabilities and knowledge sets brings many
challenges to the work of environmental NGOs in Panama, as exemplified by the
case of Fundaci—n NATURA in chapter three. There are numerous NGOs funded through Fundaci—n NATURA that
ostensibly seek to impact changes in the economic, political and social
structures leading to better management of the environment. Two such NGOs are TechnoServe and
Fundaci—n Proni–os de DariŽn.
Examining the case of each NGO provides a window into the various forms
of knowledge and expertise employed to create pockets of political activity
among various classes. It also
further demonstrates the structural challenges to and limitations of NGOs in
Panama in general, and these two NGOs in particular. The questions related to slaughtering pigs asked during each
of the two seminars exemplifies that, while both NGOs are addressing concerns
over deforestation and organic agriculture in the two areas of Panama
identified by the government and other international NGOs as the most
ecologically sensitive, the methods and the attitude of expertise vary greatly,
as well as the scale of impact.
This chapter addresses the specific nature of formalized scientific knowledge as it is combined or pitted against more informal, local knowledge. Environmental NGOs in Panama are participating in the formation of a culture of civil participatory action. NGOs are heavily implicated in establishing what are acceptable forms of knowledge applicable to environmental action in the realm of civil organization and are a key part of the process of cultural and hegemonic norms.