Abstract
Agricultural policies aimed at developing crops that take into account local biodiversity remain marginal. To define what should be considered in the return to "local cereals" in response to climate change, we put into perspective the results of two interdisciplinary projects conducted in dry areas of Senegal and India. The first, located in the Senegalese Sahel, « Relier la diversité agricole à la qualité de l’alimentation par l’analyse sociale des pratiques féminines et de l’alimentation “(DIVA), aimed to analyze the impacts of rice intensification on agricultural and food biodiversity, and the second located in the dry zone of the Deccan (South India), "Accompagner l'adaptation de l'agriculture irriguée au changement climatique" (ATCHA), studied the adaptations of irrigated agriculture to climate change, 30 years after the Green Revolution (GR). The cross-sectional analysis was conducted through the lens of the irrigated rice and rainfed sorghum cereal pair, with a focus on women's activities related to these crops. This analysis revealed strong links between the agro-environmental consequences of the agricultural changes analyzed, their food translations and the cultural losses that result: the intensification of rice in the Senegal River Valley and of VR in India not only cause a decline in the agricultural biodiversity of local cereals, but also damage the adaptive capacities and nutritional quality of meals and the quality of life. Focusing on women's activities also highlights their own difficulties in maintaining agricultural and food diversity. Yet these cereal-based systems are "resilient" in terms of local varieties and associated knowledge, as evidenced by the return of the ‘millets system’, Indian millets and sorghums marginalized by GR, promoted in some states of India under the impetus of socio-political movements in response to climate change.