Agricultural Development NGOs, Anthropology, and the Encounter with Cultural Knowledge

This article is intended to contribute to development anthropologists' understanding of the role of cultural knowledge in the context of agricultural rural development projects run by NGOs in the Third World. Paying particular attention to narrative constructs of deficiency in local livelihoods and knowledge of indigenous peasants of highland Peru, it is argued that these constructs impede a fuller appreciation of the value of culture and the potential of local knowledge for development and conservation. In this respect, the role of development anthropologists is crucial, not only because of their familiarity with cultural knowledge but also because they are positioned to harmonize developmentalist agendas with cultural knowledge. Drawing on ethnographic data, the article examines one particular case of a Peruvian NGO seeking to incorporate indigenous knowledge into its praxis. The tensions that emerge through this incorporation are investigated vis-a- vis the explanatory frameworks and agendas of conventional agricultural development models. It is concluded that the use of local knowledge in agricultural development necessarily entails a shift away from positivist understandings of knowledge, and that the task of development anthropologists may involve challenging some of the deep assumptions that development embodies.