Page 78 - Msingi Afrika Magazine Issue 6

MY AFRIKA

n the haze of an early ing my young son what a plant to pause, reflect, and hopefully
Kitengela morning in April, was, to which he replied that it embrace the values of what our
my son and I stood in our was ‘a green, rooted to the spot, indigenous knowledge systems
garden staring at our kale veggie that comes from a seed’. embedded in our traditional
Iplants. It was a therapeutic In agricology, we learn that if cultural practices may offer as
experience, more so given the plants were not able to take the possible remedy to the deadly
partial lock-down regime trig- energy from the sun and use it to Covid-19 malady.
gered by the latest global pan- mix together air, water and soil, While, psychologists, historians,
demic that has suffocated social we simply would not be here. In sociologists and even voodoo
life throughout the world. At the other words, humanity cannot practitioners continue to provide
garden, I took time and consid- survive without nature nor can us with what can be described
ered Sir Robert Robinson’s ob- nature exist without humanity. as fascinating examples of so-
servations that ‘plants are not There is as such a co-relation- cial processes interacting with
animals’. A proclamation that ship between them and this perception and recall, it is in-
may appear too obvious at in- co-relationship needs to be re- deed difficult to disagree with
ception, but very often the tech- stored through a circular global Thomas Frey when he observes
niques used to protect plants agricological system. Moreover, that “We’ve just hit a giant reset
from extinction, which maybe the fact that plants are rooted button on all of humanity”, that
useful for humanity at this mo- to the spot, as suggested by my is at present being driven by our
ment, are based on methods de- son earlier, is of profound impor- current state of fear and panic.
veloped for animals. tance to the plants themselves. Needless to say, I for one con-
In my view, it is the rich class- And the analogy here is that if sider the ongoing plague as a
es in our so called ‘modern so- you are unable to run away from transition to a more inclusive
cieties’ including here in Africa, danger then you have to devel- society in the newly found spirit
whose universal thirst for private op strategies that enable you to of collective action and shared
profit has led them to neglect tolerate whatever life and nature responsibility.
and exploit the ecosystem to throws at you, this according to Today, out there in the margins,
the extent of breaking the unity Professor Robinson is known all societies whether in Europe,
and interdependence of an oth- as phenotypic plasticity which is America or here in Africa as we
erwise coherent natural system more developed in plants than know it, are currently undergo-
that has led to the current dead- in animals. Needless to say, the ing an unprecedented change,
ly outbreak of a virus we do not rational unity of plant and animal
yet have a cure for. It is import- through a rigorous conception
ant for us to realize that the eco- situated in agricology deserves
system is built on geological for- a wide appeal more so at this Dogon Astrology
mations and the living forms that age of Corona.
inhabit it are a single community
of interconnected beings which Resetting Humanity
includes the sun, the moon, the To begin with, the fact that we
stars, plants, animals and hu- are living in extraordinary times
mans who exist together as a is now not debatable. In this
compact unity. And as argued so called Corona-era, the age
in agricology, my subject focus of heavy guns and hardware is
in this discussion, each mode of slowly coming to an end, and is
existence of each of these en- gradually being replaced by bio,
tities has its unique rights and cyber, and mind wars. The con-
functions within the totality and cept of imminent risk and men-
each is able to contribute to the acing danger is being reframed
existence of the other in a mutu- around non-intuitive, non-visi-
al supporting manner that bene- ble, and non-obvious threats.
fits our planet. On the other hand, the impact
Phenotypic Plasticity of the global pandemic has also
At the garden, I remember ask- managed to create time for us

78 | heal . restore . rebirth . Afrika