Colaboratory Kitchen Sets Up in Three Communities of Mexico

Developing strategies for climate action is more urgent than ever now it is evident that global politics are failing to take the necessary steps to realise the sustainability goals and stop global warming. Climate action to stop global warming is undeniably one of the most urgent topics of our time.

The Colaboratory Kitchen – Cocina Colaboratorio project was launched in 2020 as a PAPIIT project of the National Autonomous University of Mexico, a proposal to bring the knowledge from Universities and actors from different disciplines to three communities, to build upon different forms of knowledge joint actions towards sustainable futures. The search for local, national and global sustainability can be achieved by trans-disciplinary work. This model for co-production of knowledge towards sustainable alternatives requires: being located in the specific context and place, recognising the different world views, and promoting constant process of mutual learning through care networks.

In early 2018, Cascoland began a Colaboratory Kitchen (Keepers Lab&Kitchen) pilot in Chiapas, southern Mexico, in close collaboration with Wageningen University & Research (WUR) and the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). Just two years later, Cascoland and UNAM have developed a 3-year trans-disciplinary curriculum around this concept. The Colaboratory Kitchen is a project of action, co-creation, teaching and research in the search for fairer, more resilient and sustainable agro-food systems. The Kitchen is the heart of the project where daily encounters take place, initiating actions towards the landscape, the plot, the community, the environment. Creative practices, food and social the design of communication spaces are the catalysers for inspiration and exchange.

For 3 years, different actions will be carried out in three communities: Marqués de Comillas, Chiapas, Santo Domingo Tomalpec, Oaxaca, and Xochimilco, Mexico City. Marqués de Comillas, Chiapass, faces an accelerated deforestation of a diverse tropical forest, while in Santo Domingo, Oaxaca, the ancestral Zapotec biocultural heritage is at risk due to increasing globalization, and in Xochimilco, Mexico City, the impacts of urban growth are combined with ancestral agricultural roots and oportunities from the city. During the three years, new collaboration networks will be formed by bringing together local actors of the three communities with academics, students and professionals from different branches of the biophysical, social, humanities, artists, designers, and chefs to set a transformation in motion. These long term transformations will focus on deviating from the processes that have generated injustices and environmental degradation in these location. Collaborations between UNAM, the University of Wageningen (Netherlands), the international collective of artists and designers Cascoland, universities and national organizations, will contribute to the development of temporary and permanent communication spaces on the three locations.

The next phase of Colaboratory Kitchen was launched at a meeting in late January 2020 where the project participants met and exchanged the first ideas. The trans-disciplinary teams will be present at the three sites simultaneously between the months of February and April of this year. UNAM researchers and students, Cascoland creatives and other collaborators will work closely together to begin developing a new interdisciplinary form of academic work and research, mobilising local communities to participate and begin building and activating knowledge exchange spaces on the long term.

We invite you all to join us at the kitchen table!