Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Wild Food Harvesting and Access by Household and Generation in the Talamanca Bribri Indigenous Territory, Costa Rica

  • Published:
Human Ecology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

We contribute to a growing body of literature on wild food harvesting by examining culturally specific relationships with wild food, the extent and frequency of wild food use in forests, and young people’s wild food consumption. We gathered qualitative data in the Talamanca Bribri Territory, Costa Rica, using participant observation, interviews, and household surveys. We found that wild food consumption was related to nutrition, health, religious beliefs, identity, dietary variety, and resource availability. Consumption occurred in all households and its frequency depended upon opportunities to harvest and/or access to sharing networks. In all households, younger members consumed wild plants and in most households they also ate wild meat. All households harvested their own plants but not all households harvested their own meat. Consequently, sharing was relatively more common for meat than plants. Lastly, sharing was important for older and younger generations and women who lacked opportunities to harvest food due to health, time, school, and work constraints. Our results can be used to design forest management policies that respect community access to wild food.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. For example, in 2012, Bribri youth in Bajo Coen designed such a program regarding medicinal plant knowledge.

References

  • Altrichter, M. (2011). Importancia de la fauna como alimento para los Indígenas Bribri y Cabécar de Talamanca. Biocenosis 25: 87–95.

    Google Scholar 

  • Angelsen, A., and Lund, J. F. (2011). Designing the household questionnaire. In Angelsen, A., Larsen, H. O., Lund, J. F., Smith-Hall, C., and Wunder, S. (eds.), Measuring Livelihoods and Environmental Dependence: Methods for Research and Fieldwork. Earthscan, London, pp. 107–126.

    Google Scholar 

  • Annegers, J. F. (1973). Seasonal Food Shortages in West Africa. Ecology of Food and Nutrition 2: 251–257.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Aspelin, P. L. (1979). Food Distribution and Social Bonding Among the Mamainde of Mato Gross, Brazil. Journal of Anthropological Research 35: 309–327.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Batal, M., and Hunter, E. (2007). Traditional Lebanese Recipes Based on Wild Plants: An Answer to Diet Simplification? Food and Nutrition Bulletin 28(suppl. 2): 303S–311S.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bharucha, Z., and Pretty, J. (2010). The Roles and Values of Wild Foods in Agricultural Systems. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B 365: 2913–2926.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bliege Bird, R., Scelza, B., Bird, D. W., and Smith, E. A. (2012). The Hierarchy Virtue: Mutualism, Altruism and Signaling in Martu Women’s Cooperative Hunting. Evolution and Human Behavior 33: 64–78.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Borge, C. (2011). El policultivo Indígena de Talamanca y la conservación de la naturaleza. Instituto Nacional de Biodiversidad.

  • Brant Castellano, M. (2004). Ethics of Aboriginal Research. Journal of Aboriginal Health 1: 98–114.

    Google Scholar 

  • Butler, C. (2008). Human health and forests: an overview. In Colfer, C. J. P. (ed.), Human Health and Forests: A Global Overview of Issues, Practice and Policy. Earthscan, London, pp. 13–33.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bye Jr., R. A. (1981). Quelites – Ethnoecology of Edible Greens – Past, Present, and Future. Journal of Ethnobiology 1: 109–123.

    Google Scholar 

  • Campbell, B. M. (1987). The Use of Wild Plants in Zimbabwe. Economic Botany 41: 375–385.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Colfer, C. J. P. (2008). Human Health and Forests: Global Overview of Issues, Practice and Policy. Earthscan, London.

    Google Scholar 

  • Collings, P., Wenzel, G., and Condon, R. G. (1998). Modern Food Sharing Networks and Community Integration in the Central Canadian Arctic. Arctic 51: 301–314.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Creswell, J. W. (2014). Research Design: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Mixed Methods Approaches, SAGE Publications, Inc.

  • Cruz García, G. S. (2006). The Mother – Child Nexus. Knowledge and Valuation of Wild Food Plants in Wayanad, Western Ghats, India. Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine 2: 39 doi:10.1186/1746-4269-2-39.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Damman, S., Eide, W. B., and Kuhnlein, H. V. (2008). Indigenous Peoples’ Nutrition Transition in a Right to Food Perspective. Food Policy 33: 135–155.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Daniggelis, E. (2003). Women and ‘wild’ foods: Nutrition and household food security among Rai and Sherpa forager farmers in Eastern Nepal In Howard, P. L. (ed.) Women and Plants: Gender Relations in Biodiversity Management and Conservation, Zen Books.

  • de Merode, E., Homewood, K., and Cowlishaw, G. (2004). The Value of Bushmeat and Other Wild Foods to Rural Households Living in Extreme Poverty in Demoncratic Republic of Congo. Biological Conservation 118: 573–581.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Delang, C. (2006). Not Just Minor Forest Products: The Economic Rationale for the Consumption of Wild Food Plants by Subsistence Farmers. Ecological Economics 59: 64–73.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dweba, T. P., and Mearns, M. A. (2011). Conserving Indigenous Knowledge as the Key to the Current and Future Use of Traditional Vegetables. International Journal of Information Management 31: 564–571.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Etkin, N. L. (1994). The cull of the wild. In Etkin, N. L. (ed.), Eating on the Wild Side: The Pharmacologic, Ecologic, and Social Implications of Using Noncultigens. The University of Arizona Press, Tucson, pp. 1–24.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fa, J. E., Currie, D., and Meeuwig, J. (2003). Bushmeat and Food Security in the Congo Basin: Linkages Between Wildlife and People’s Future. Environmental Conservation 30: 71–78.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • García-Serrano, C. R., and Del Monte, J. P. (2004). The Use of Tropical Forest (Agroecosystems and Wild Plant Harvesting) as a Source of Food in the Bribri and Cabécar Cultures of the Caribbean Coast of Costa Rica. Economic Botany 58: 58–71.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Golden, C. D., Fernald, L. C. H., Brashares, J. S., Rasolofoniaina, B. J. R., and Kremen, C. (2011). Benefits of Wildlife Consumption to Child Nutrition in a Biodiversity Hotspot. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 108: 19653–19656.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Grivetti, L. E., and Ogle, B. M. (2000). Value of Traditional Foods in Meeting Macro- and Micronutrient Need: The Wild Plant Connection. Nutrition Research Reviews 13: 31–46.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gurven, M. (2004). Reciprocal Altruism and Food Sharing Decisions Among Hiwi and Ache hunter-Gatherers. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology 56: 366–380.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gurven, M., Allen-Arave, W., Hill, K., and Hurtado, M. (2001). Reservation Food Sharing Among the Ache of Paraguay. Human Nature 124: 273–298.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gurven, M., Hill, K., and Kaplan, H. (2002). From Forest to Reservation: Transitions in Food Sharing Behavior Among the Ache of Paraguay. Journal of Anthropological Research 581: 93–120.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gurven, M., Hill, K., and Jakugi, F. (2004). Why Do Foragers Share and Sharers Forage? Explorations of Social Dimensions of Foraging. Socioeconomic Aspects of Human Behavioral Ecology. Research in Economic Anthropology 23: 19–43.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hadjichambis, A. C., Paraskeva-Hadjichambi, D., Della, A., Elena Giusti, M. E., De Pasquale, C., Lenzarini, C., Censorii, E., Gonzales-tejero, M. R., Sanchez-rojas, C. P., Ramiro-Gutierrez, J. M., Skoula, M., Johnson, C., Sarpak, A., Hmamouchi, M., Jorhi, S., El-Demerdash, M., El-Zayat, M., and Pieroni, A. (2008). Wild and Semi-Domesticated Food Plant Consumption In Seven Circum-Mediterranean Areas. International Journal of Food Sciences and Nutrition 59: 383–414.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hames, R. (2000). Reciprocal altruism in Yanomamö food exchange. In Cronk, L., Chagnon, N., and Irons, W. (eds.) Human Behavior and Adaptation: An Anthropological Perspective, Aldine Transaction.

  • Huss-Ashmore, R., and Johnston, S. L. (1994). Wild plants as cultural adaptations to food stress. In Etkin, N. L. (ed.), Eating on the Wild Side: The Pharmacologic, Ecologic, and Social Implications of Using Noncultigens. The University of Arizona Press, Tucson, pp. 62–84.

    Google Scholar 

  • [INEC] Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Census (2013). Censo nacional de población y VI de vivienda: territorios Indígenas. Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Census, Costa Rica.

    Google Scholar 

  • Johns, T., and Maundu, P. (2006). Forest Biodiversity, Nutrition and Population Health in Market-Oriented Food Systems. Unasylva 224(57): 34–40.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kaplan, H., Hill, K., Hawkes, K., and Hurtado, A. M. (1984). Food Sharing Among the Ache Hunter-gatherers of Eastern Paraguay. Current Anthropology 25: 113–115.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kehoe, M. (2014). Ethnographic explorations of the foodways of three generations of women in Kasabonika Lake First Nation. Masters Thesis. University of Ottawa.

  • Kovach, M. (2009). Indigenous Methodologies: Characteristics, Conversations and Contexts. University of Toronto Press Incorporated, Toronto.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kuhnlein, H. V., and Turner, N. J. (1991). Traditional plant foods of Canadian Indigenous peoples: Nutrition, botany and use. In Katz, S. H. (ed.) Food and Nutrition in History and Anthropology Vol. 8, Gordon and Breach Publishers.

  • Kuhnlein, H. V., Erasmus, B., Spigelski, D., and Burlingame, B. (eds.). 2013. Indigneous Peoples’ Food Systems and Well-Being: Interventions and Policies for Healthy Communities. FAO.

  • Ladio, A., and Lozada, M. (2004). Patterns of Use and Knowledge of Wild Edible Plants in Distinct Ecological Environments: A Case Study of a Mapuche Community from Northwestern Patagonia. Biodiversity and Conservation 13: 1153–1173.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lansing, D. M. (2014). Discourse and the Production of Territorial Hegemony: Indigenous Peoples, the United Fruit Company and the Capitalist State in Costa Rica, 1872–1916. Journal of Historical Geography 45(1): 38–49.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Morales, R., Barborak, J. R., and MacFarland, C. (1984). Planning and managing a multi- component, multi-category international Biosphere Reserve: the case of the La Amistad/Talamanca Range/Bocas de Toro wildlands complex of Costa Rica and Panama. Paper presented at the First International Biosphere Reserve Congress, Minsk, USSR. Conference proceedings, UNESCO (Natural Resources Research XXI) Vol. 1: 168–177.

  • Ohmagari, K., and Berkes, F. (1997). Transmission of Indigenous Knowledge and Bush Skills Among the Western James Bay Cree Women of the Subartic Canada. Human Ecology 25: 197–222.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pfeiffer, J. M., and Butz, R. J. (2005). Assessing Cultural and Ecological Variation in Ethnobiological Research: the Importance of Gender. Journal of Ethnobiology 25: 240–278.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pieroni, A. (2001). Evaluation of the Cultural Significance of Wild Food Botanicals Traditionally Consumed in Northwestern Tuscany, Italy. Journal of Ethnobiology 21: 89–104.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pimentel, D., McNair, M., Buck, L., Pimentel, M., and Kamil, J. (1997). The Value of Forests to World Food Security. Human Ecology 25: 91–120.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Posey, D. A., Frechione, J., Eddins, J., and da Silva, L. F. (1984). Ethnoecology as Applied Anthropology in Amazonian Development. Human Organization 43: 95–107.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Powell, B., Mandu, P., Kuhnlein, H. V., and Johns, T. (2013). Wild Foods from Farm and Forest in the East Usambara Mountains, Tanzania. Ecology of Food and Nutrition 52: 451–478.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Power, E. M. (2008). Conceptualizing Food Security for Aboriginal People in Canada. Canadian Journal of Public Health 99: 95–97.

    Google Scholar 

  • Robsinson, J. (2014). Eating on the Wild Side: The Missing Link to Optimum Health, Little, Brown and Company.

  • Rodriguez, M., Montiel, S., Cervera, M. D., Catillo, M. T., and Naranjo, E. J. (2012). The Practice and Perception of batida (group hunting) in a Maya Community of Yucatan, Mexico. Journal of Ethnobiology 32: 212–227.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ruddle, K., and Chesterfield, R. (1977). Education for Traditional Food Procurement in the Orinoco Delta. University of California Press, Berkeley.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ryan, G. W., and Bernard, R. (2003). Techniques to Identify Themes. Field Methods 15: 85–109.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Senaratne, A., Piyasena, A., and Wijaya, J. (2003). Changing Role of Non- Timber Forest Products (NTFP) in Rural Household Economy: the Case of Sinharaja World Heritage Site in Sri Lanka. Environmental Management 32: 559–571.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Shava, S. (2000). The use of Indigenous plants as food by a rural community in the eastern cape: an educational exploration. Masters Thesis, Rhodes University.

  • Shukla, S., and Sinclair, A. J. (2009). Becoming a Traditional Medicinal Plant Healer: Divergent Views of Practicing and Young Healers on Traditional Medicinal Plant Knowledge Skills in India. Ethnobotany Research and Applications 7: 29–51.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • SINAC (2012). La Amistad International Park Management Plan, Talamanca. Ministry of the Environment, Energy, and Technology (MINAET), SINAC, San Jose.

    Google Scholar 

  • Somnasang, P., and Moreno-Black, G. (2000). Knowing, Gathering and Eating: Knowledge and Attitudes About Wild Food in an Isan village in Northeastern Thailand. Journal of Ethnobiology 20: 197–216.

    Google Scholar 

  • Suarez, E., Morales, E., Cueva, R., Utreras-Bucheli, V., Zapata-Rios, G., Toral, E., Torres, J., Prado, W., and Vargas-Olalla, J. (2009). Oil Industry, Bushmeat Trade and Roads: Indirect Effects of Oil Extraction Activities in a Protected Area in North-Eastern Ecuador. Animal Conservation 12: 364–373.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sylvester, O., and Avalos, G. (2009). Illegal Palm Heart (Geonoma edulis) Harvest in Costa Rican National Parks: Patterns of Consumption and Extraction. Economic Botany 63(2): 179–189.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sylvester, O., and García Segura, A. (2016). Landscape Ethnoecology of Forest Food Harvesting in the Talamanca Bribri Indigenous Territory, Costa Rica. Journal of Ethnobiology 36(1): 215–233.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sylvester, O., García Segura, A., and Davidson-Hunt, I. J. (2016a). Complex Relationships among Gender and Forest Food Harvesting: Insights from the Bribri Indigenous Territory, Costa Rica. International Forestry Review 18(2): 247–260.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sylvester, O., García Segura, A., and Davidson-Hunt, I. J. (2016b). The protection of rainforest biodiversity can conflict with food access for Indigenous people. Conservation and Society (in press).

  • Tardío, J., Pascual, H., and Morales, R. (2005). Wild Food Plants Traditionally Used in the Province of Madrid Central spain. Economic Botany 59: 122–136.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tuck-Po, L. (2008). Before a step too far: walking with Batek hunter-gatherers in the forests of Pahang Malaysia. In Ingold, T. and Vergunst, J. L. (eds.) Ways of Walking: Ethnography and Practice on Foot. Ashgate Publishing Company, pp. 20–34.

  • Tuhaiwai Smith, L. (2012[1999]). Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples, Zen Books Ltd.

  • Turner, N. J., and Clifton, H. (2006). “The forest and the seaweed”: Gitga’at seaweed, traditional ecological knowledge, and community survival. In Pieroni, A., and Price, L. L. (eds.), Eating and Healing. Traditional Food as Medicine. Haworth Press, Binghamption, pp. 153–178.

    Google Scholar 

  • Turner, N. J., and Davis, A. (1993). “When Everything was Scarce”: The Role of Plants as Famine Foods in Northwestern North America. Journal of Ethnobiology 13: 171–201.

    Google Scholar 

  • Turner, N. J. and Thompson J. (Eds.). 2006.’Nwana’a lax Yuup: plants of the Gitga’at People. Cortex Consulting Inc., Victoria, British Columbia.

  • [UNESCO] United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. (2014). World Network of Biospheres (14 May 2015 www.unesco.org/new/en/natural-sciences/environment/ecological-sciences/biosphere-reserves/world-network-wnbr/).

  • [UNEP] United Nations Environmental Program. (2013). World Heritage Sites: Talamanca Range- La Amistad Reserves/La Amistad National Park Costa Rica & Panama. United Nations Environment Programme. (14 May 2015 www.unep-wcmc.org/world-heritage-information-sheets_271.html).

  • Urry, J. (1999). Sociology Beyond Societies. Routledge, London.

    Google Scholar 

  • Villalobos, V., and Borge, C. (1998). Talamanca en la encrucijada. . Editorial Universidad Estatal A Distancia, San Jose.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wyndham, F. S. (2010). Environments of Learning: Rarámuri Children’s Plant Knowledge and Experience of Schooling, Family, and Landscapes in the Sierra Tarahumara, Mexico. Human Ecology 38: 87–99.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zarger, R. K., and Stepp, J. R. (2004). Persistence of Botanical Knowledge Among Tzeltal Maya Children. Current Anthropology 45: 413–418.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zinyama, L. M., Matiza, T., and Campbell, D. J. (1990). The Use of Wild Foods During Periods of Food Shortage in Rural Zimbabwe. Ecology of Food and Nutrition 24: 251–265.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgments

Wë́ste wë́ste, thank you to our Bribri colleagues who shared their knowledge and provided guidance on how to present our research. Thank you to Carlos Morales who helped with plant identification. This work was carried out with the aid of a grant from the International Development Research Centre, Ottawa, Canada. Information on the Centre is available on the web at www.idrc.ca. This work was also supported by a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Doctoral Fellowship awarded to Sylvester and a SSHRC Grant awarded to Iain J Davidson-Hunt.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University for Peace, Ciudad Colon, PO Box 138-6100, San José, Costa Rica

    Olivia Sylvester

  2. Escuela de Filología, Lingüística y Literature, Universidad de Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica

    Alí García Segura

  3. Natural Resources Institute, University of Manitoba, 303-70 Dysart Road, Winnipeg, MB, R3T 2M6, Canada

    Iain J. Davidson-Hunt

Authors
  1. Olivia Sylvester
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Alí García Segura
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Iain J. Davidson-Hunt
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Olivia Sylvester.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Sylvester, O., Segura, A.G. & Davidson-Hunt, I.J. Wild Food Harvesting and Access by Household and Generation in the Talamanca Bribri Indigenous Territory, Costa Rica. Hum Ecol 44, 449–461 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10745-016-9847-4

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10745-016-9847-4

Keywords

Search

Navigation