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Each year, gatherers of indigenous plants traditionally used by
the Yankton Sioux report that the food sources have become harder
and harder to find. Chokecherry trees, wild plum bushes, medicine
herbs, wild berries, vegetables and roots are encroached upon
by the development, farming and ranching that overrode wild prairie.
Now toxic herbicides and pesticides are used to kill off many
medicinal plants that farmers consider “weeds.” Yet for generations,
indigenous plants provided us nutritional foods and medicines
adapted to our body systems, and played important parts in our
ceremonies.
In order to revive the prevalence of these indigenous plants and
sustain the traditions of their use, the Native American Women’s
Health Education Resource Center is initiating a Traditional Food
System Preservation Program. Besides passing traditional knowledge
to the next generation and developing future economic potential,
the Program will also help address the problem of hunger. According
to a recent radio show on “Native American Calling,” 1 in 5 Native
American families lack the resources to feed their families each
month. By nurturing the indigenous plant life tha
Chokecherry berries |
t has traditionally sustained us, the Program takes the Resource
Center’s past garden-promoting activities to the next step, helping
support the nutrition and healthy diet of our heritage.
First, the Program will provide indigenous fruit plants and herbs
to grow on Yankton Sioux Reservation lands, yards and community
areas. Moreover, elders will offer workshops instructing people
about how to make the traditional food products, how to identify
indigenous plants and what purposes they can be used for. For
instance, the chokecherry provides wojopi, a traditional pudding;
dried chokecherry patties used to make the ceremonial food, wasna;
cherry juice for Sun Dances; and jam for toast and biscuits. Indigenous
wild mint makes chiaka, a medicinal tea that soothes stomach problems
or a colicky infant; and soap that helps heal skin rashes. When
participants learn these skills, they can generate revenue from
most of the products by selling or trading them for other goods.
This year the Program will hold a produce fair during the Fort
Randall Wacipi, with prizes for contests like best chokecherry
jam, wasna, wild plum pie or wild plum jam. Each year the contest
categories will be expanded, and these activities will help encourage
families to develop products that can be sold at local outlets.
Program participants who want to market their products will be
provided technical assistance in packaging, labeling, distribution
and business. The Resource Center also plans to purchase some
traditional food products to sell on its website, and give to
elders as gifts through its Food Pantry holiday boxes.
Even as chemical sprays have killed and contaminated indigenous
vegetation, mainstream demand for these plants is high. In fact,
many mainstream followers of indigenous ways repeatedly over-harvest
indigenous plants from reservations on all our native lands, including
the Yankton Sioux Reservation, without permission or regard for
future yields. To combat these problems, the Program will work
with the Tribal Government to develop codes and resolutions that
restrict the use of harmful herbicides and pesticides on indigenous
plants, and regulate who can harvest the plants from Tribal lands.
If you are interested in participating in the Traditional Food
System Preservation Program, please contact the Resource Center
by calling (605) 487-7072. The Center will assist families in
planting the indigenous items, and is currently surveying the
community for what kinds of vegetation people would like to plant,
and what kinds of traditional food preparation skills they would
like to offer or learn. Plants offered through the Program include:
elderberry, chokecherry, wild plums, mint/chiaka, currant, sandcherry,
Mongolian cherry, mulberry, juneberry, buffuloberyy, riverbank
grape.
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