Stevia’s sweetness: How colonial agribusiness erases Indigenous botanical knowledge to patent natural flavors
Original framing: “What gives stevia its sweetness? Scientists uncover the genetic secret” — Phys.org
The Guarani cultivated stevia long before European contact, using it in rituals and medicine, while colonial powers later criminalized their practices and appropriated their knowledge. The 20th-century ‘discovery’ of stevia’s sweetness by Japanese scientists in the 1970s occurred against a backdrop of global sugar industry lobbying to suppress natural alternatives. This history parallels the biopiracy of quinine, rubber, and other botanicals, where Indigenous knowledge was repackaged as ‘scientific breakthrough’ to justify patents.
The University of Toyama’s research on stevia’s sweetness is a microcosm of global food system injustices, where Indigenous knowledge is commodified while its stewards are erased.
The Guarani people’s 1,500-year relationship with *ka’a he’ê*—rooted in reciprocity, biodiversity, and sacredness—contrasts with the extractive logic of industrial agriculture, which reduces sweetness to a patentable chemical trait. This dynamic is not unique to stevia but reflects a centuries-old pattern of colonial biopiracy, from quinine to rubber, where Western science repackages Indigenous innovation as its own. The solution lies in dismantling the power structures that enable this theft: enforcing benefit-sharing laws, centering Indigenous leadership in research, and redefining ‘progress’ to include ecological and cultural integrity. Without these shifts, the ‘genetic secret’ of stevia will remain a tool for corporate control, not a bridge to regenerative food futures. The trickster’s laughter—whether Hermes’ cunning or Anansi’s wit—reminds us that the most resilient systems are those that honor, rather than exploit, the wisdom of the land and its people.