Linda Seefeld

Rural Women's Use and High Regard of Tsampa: the Impact of the Panam Integrated Rural Development Project on Food Consumption Patterns and Awareness Linda Seefeld

The traditional Tibetan diet mainly consists of tsampa (roasted barley flour) as well as meat, butter tea and chang (homebrew beer). Chura (dried joghurt pieces), radish and potatoes are the common additionals or enriching food items. The one-sidedness of this diet is often criticized, yet it seems to be well adapted to the natural environment. At present it appears that the traditional Tibetan diet is undergoing a change. The 'Panam Integrated Rural Development Project? (PIRDP) in Tibet (TAR) has been a cooperative project between the EU and the People's Republic of China with the purpose of providing a sustainable and replicable model for improving the quality of human development in Panam. It was implemented in three pilot-villages and spanned four years from 2001 to 2005. Its focus was on the components agriculture, livestock, education, health, water-supply, irrigation and rural credit aiming at improving the standard of living of the local population. The objective of this study is to investigate whether or not there has been an impact by the PIRDP on both the local people's diet and their high regard of their food - in particular with respect to their staple tsampa.