Mexico’s first agroecology congress will be held between May 12 and 17 in San Cristobal de Las Casas, Chiapas. To mark the occasion, Slow Food will officially be welcoming the milpa system into the network of Presidia.
A complex Mesoamerican intercropping method, the milpa is a sustainable agricultural system that can combat the loss of biodiversity in rural areas thanks to the rich variety it incorporates. The most common crops, and the most representative of the local diet in the Mexican region of Chiapas, are corn, beans and squash, which coexist and form symbiotic relationships with each other and other plants like tomatoes, chili peppers, quelites (wild herbs), fruit trees and dozens of other vegetables, as well as fungi and insects who find their ideal habitat in the milpa.
