The global food system is the one of the important drivers of biodiversity loss, with agriculture, given its demand for land and pesticides, being the identified threat to 86% of species at risk of extinction. Some studies have shown that planting local produce and practising sustainable agriculture can reduce the need to clear forests and pressures on biodiversity.
Monocropping, or growing a single crop species, of non-indigenous, high-yielding staples – driven by policies and government subsidies – has further affected the already declining popularity of indigenous or local produce. Adding to this, consumer trends have boosted the demand for exotic foods, says Sumeet Kaur of Spudnik Farms in Bengaluru, Karnataka. She cites broccoli as an example, and says, “It was a vegetable unheard of until the 1990s, which was then popularised by restaurants and magazines and is now commonly seen in local vegetable markets and people’s diets.”
Of late, however, there seems to be an increasing shift towards local produce. As per the 2024 India Food Services Report, the National Restaurant Association of India has identified “sustainability” as a key consumer trend. “Consumers are becoming more aware of where their food comes from, about locally sourced ingredients,” Sagar Daryani, president of the restaurant association, a body representing over 500,000 restaurants in the country, tells Mongabay India. “Brands are moving their focus to seasonal produce, straight from farmers.”
The growing consciousness about the benefits of eating local, seasonal produce is also evident with the rising popularity of food festivals, residencies, workshops, pop-up restaurants, and entrepreneurs who are building the farm-to-fork connection and motivating farmers to grow indigenous produce.
Food festivals
Kaur’s initiative, the Rooting for Tubers Festival, for example, highlights the benefits and wide variety of local tubers grown across India. Held annually in the first week of December in Bengaluru, the festival’s third edition showcased 45 varieties of tubers from Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Tripura, Karnataka, and Odisha and how the local communities consume them. There were interactive workshops with chefs, discussions, food stalls and even an art installation. It also kicked off a residency in Joida, Karnataka, where chefs, food critics, social media influencers, artists, photographers, researchers and others will engage with the local Kunbi community.
“Most of our visitors were either people who led busy lives and were keen on adopting a healthier lifestyle, or a younger, eco-conscious crowd. They wanted to learn how to cook these different tubers,” says Kaur. Mudali, or specifically Kunbi mudali, a tuber grown by the Kunbi community in Joida in the Western Ghats, was a highlight in the festival and the guests learnt how to make rava mudali fry. “Sustainability and biodiversity conservation were trending words until a few years back. Now, it’s a necessity,” Kaur continues.
People’s perspective on food has changed in the last decade, says chef Thomas Zacharias, founder of Locavore, a platform that champions local food through storytelling, events, advocacy and partnerships. “It has been some time since traditional food was re-introduced in restaurant menus, but now there is more research to include hyperlocal produce in the modern food culture and stories. Hence, there is more engagement with chefs,” says Zacharias.
In September 2024, Locavore and OOO Farms organised the sixth edition of the Wild Food Festival in Mumbai, in which 10 chefs engaged with the tribal community of Palghar, Maharashtra, to learn how they use wild vegetables in their cuisine.
“There were 50-60 kinds of wild vegetables. It piqued people’s curiosity, challenged their perspective,” Zacharias shares. At the festival, visitors saw fresh produce such as the Indian thorny bamboo, fatangdi, kurdu and kharshinga that grow during monsoon in the Sahyadri mountain ranges of Maharashtra. About 30 people from the Bhil, Kokni, Warli, Mahadeo Koli, and Katkari tribal communities, prepared dishes using the local produce.
The recently concluded Nilgiris Earth Festival in Tamil Nadu, is yet another celebration of indigenous food and culture, and the ecology of the Nilgiris. This four-day festival featured, among other things, a meal tasting with the local tribal community, Badagas, an experience of a farm-to-table wood-fired cooking, and talks on indigenous food, including a meal cooked with local produce from the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve, that visitors were be able to sample.
Chefs making a change
There is also an increasing acknowledgement of the role of chefs in popularising hyperlocal produce and traditional cuisine. Zacharias, for instance, recently concluded a visit to the Garo hills in Meghalaya exploring the local cuisine in villages as part of his mission, Chef on the Road. “I started COTR 10 years ago to learn and share the traditional ways of cooking by tribal communities,” he says. Sometimes, he invites people to join him on such visits for a first-hand experience. He cooks mahua flower bhaji or subji with the local residents in Palghar (Maharashtra) and even harvests pepper in Munnar (Kerala).
At the global level, The Chef’s Manifesto is a chef-led project of more than 1,500 chefs around the world who explore ways to achieve a sustainable food system. One of their action plans is to promote local and seasonal food by showcasing local producers and traditional techniques in their menus. Chef Sabyasachi Gorai from India is a part of this movement. “The level of awareness among consumers (about sustainability) is still not as high as I would like it to be, but having said that, there is an overall growth in consciousness about hyper-local cuisines and local produce. Foodies, bloggers, home chefs are playing an important role in that,” says Gorai.
Until 2020, when Covid-19 hit, Gorai connected with local producers and farmers in Meghalaya and Assam in India’s northeast. “I would place orders every 15 days to get fresh local produce, like betel leaf, bamboo leaf, hill coriander, from farmers to my restaurant in Pune,” he shares. While there was a halt during the Covid-19 lockdown, is, he now continues to source produce for his traditional cuisines from their place of origin.
Social enterprises
The pandemic was a major setback to the food and beverage industry, due to the shutdown of operations and disruptions in supply chain, say the food industry experts. “But it also made people more conscious about their health,” opines Anamika Das, the managing director of Kilmora, a social enterprise working with farmers in the Kumaon hills of Uttarakhand to bring their agri-produce and handicraft items to consumers. “After Covid-19, people became more conscious about the impact of food on their bodies. Talking about sustainable choices has now become dinner table conversation.”
Das speaks from experience – although Kilmora has been around for 27 years now, it has seen a rise in enquiries for local produce over the last few years. For instance, their rain-fed rajma (red kidney beans) sold out during the tourist season in Nainital last summer. Their cold-pressed apricot oil from the local variety called chuaru – “it cannot be transported because it ripens quickly” – is also popular. “We encourage farmers to grow indigenous crops, like the Kumaoni millet, using traditional techniques. These kinds of local produce are more climate resilient, we have realised, as climatic changes are increasingly being felt here,” Das explains.
Himalayan Haat, another Uttarakhand-based social enterprise practising forest farming in Pauri Garhwal, is similarly seeing a rise in demand for their produce, like apple cider vinegar, malta cooler, rhododendron cooler and spiced peach preserve. They even have recipes on their website, using the produce they offer – millet salad, malta gin cocktail, plum whiskey smash and fruit popsicle, to name a few. “The fruits that we grow are seasonal and local. We also forage wild blackberries and raspberries that are available only for a few weeks in June,” says Divya Chowfin, co-founder of Himalayan Haat.
Both Kilmora and Himalayan Haat also supply their produce to cafes in cities like Delhi, Mussoorie and Dehradun. Das, for example, works with artisanal baker Keith Goyden, who uses Kumaoni millet in crackers and cakes.
However, both Das and Chowfin acknowledged the economic challenge of being in a market with all-year-round crops. “When it comes to rajma for example, I cannot compete at price point with those that are grown all year round. Our rajma is rain-fed and therefore available seasonally,” Das states. Producer organisations believe that with the removal of multiple middlemen in the market linkages, farmers are getting better prices for their produce and thus encouraged to continue farming local crops. Chowfin also adds, “For repeat purchase by customers, our focus is on quality and not so much on quantity.”
Content creator and entrepreneur Tanisha Phanbuh of Shillong, Meghalaya, similarly sources her produce straight from home when she organises her traditional food pop-up events in restaurants in Delhi. “I get the dry produce, like local rice, black sesame seeds, from home in bulk, and get the fresh produce couriered,” she shares. “I have been doing these pop-ups since 2017, and each time, the response has been massive.”
Hill Wild, another entrepreneurial venture, that sources indigenous food from Manipur and Nagaland, also organises Naga Supper Club in Delhi and the US, in which one can sign up for a Naga meal cooked using local produce and traditional techniques like fermentation, drying and smoking.
Sustainability is an important aspect of all these efforts. For example, Himalayan Haat plants local oak trees. “Instead of cutting forests to grow crops, we sustain the forest by growing local oak trees in place of the invasive pine, which in turn helps sustain the forest springs. We also practice intercropping, like is the tradition,” says Chowfin.
Hill Wild is re-wilding 20 hectares of deforested land in Manipur’s Teinem village with indigenous fruit trees like lemon and black cherry, as well as hill tomato whose yield will help the local community generate income. Some organisations are also prioritising community self-sustenance. Kaur of Spudnik Farms, for instance, ensures that the Kunbi community sets aside tubers for their own consumption before selling.
“There is a shift in consumers towards healthier, organic and locally sourced ingredients,” says Daryani of NRAI. “There is a peak in demand for farm-to-table practices, which is inspiring chefs and restaurants to transform menus and increase collaboration with local producers.” The slow food movement is gradual, but as Daryani adds, “India’s gastronomic landscape is changing”.
This article was first published on Mongabay.
