Creole gardens support food and resilience in Guadeloupe ^{CEFR B2}

Creole gardens in Guadeloupe are small, diverse home plots that provide staple foods and medicinal plants while supporting social ties and local resilience. Banana trees, tubers (yams and manioc), fruit trees such as avocado and mango, and aromatic plants grow together in a multi-species system that helps families meet daily needs and respond to crises.

INRAE Antilles Guyane carried out a survey on the pandemic's impact and concluded that local and traditional practices strengthened resilience and increased awareness of the need to change consumption patterns and revive subsistence farming. Jean-Marc Blazy, director of the ASTRO research unit, highlights the main climate impacts: reduced production after catastrophic events like hurricanes and floods, and lower flowering and yields due to heat, drought and warmer nights that reduce nycthemeral amplitude.

The EXPLORER programme brings together INRAE, CIRAD, the University of the West Indies, the Chamber of Agriculture, local authorities and Météo France to combine Creole garden know-how with tools such as weather stations and bio-inputs and to support farmers toward agro-ecological methods. Recommended measures include adjusting crop calendars, increasing varietal and agro-biodiversity, mixing species and creating synergies between crops and livestock to lower the risk from single hazards and promote social and environmental justice.

Many farmers are restoring ancestral practices. Hugues Occibrun, co-founder of the cooperative 100%Zeb with Astrid Grelet, runs a garden of over 300 species, offers training and sells Caribbean medicinal and aromatic plants, and links gardens to crises such as the LKP in 2009 and COVID. Regional projects like INTERREG CambioNet foster solidarity with South American partners, though international exchanges with Brazil and Africa face legal and economic barriers. Activists and ancestral practices are helping Guadeloupe move toward greater food sovereignty.