Hina`i: Hawai`i Center for Sustainable Food & Agriculture

Hina`i, translated from Hawaiian, is a basket or container made of braided `ie vine, pandanus, or other material. Hina`i serves as a metaphor for this project, in which we wove a community of practitioners, scientists, and community members to learn and share traditional and modern information regarding our island food systems.

As Kia`i`ai, or stewards of our food system, it is our expressed commitment to ensure that the stories and information about the land and its people honor our communal values that we share across our beloved pae `āina `O Hawai`i, the Hawaiian archipelago, and that we may restore a healthy, vibrant sustainable food system for the generations that follow.

Through a generous grant from the Association for Native Americans, HACBED utilized three important elements of this conceptual framework to meet this goal:

(1) convene partners in a regional Hina`i Network to support place-based iterations of existing agricultural eduprise models;

(2) implement and expand local eduprises and related practices and determine best practices on a local and regional level that will further iterate alternative eduprise models and existing curricula; and

(3) build the capacity of local and regional Communities of Practice to sustain place-based eduprise iterations, refining the regional Hina`i Network to sustain broader indigenized space for eduprise activity support.

The Hina`i Network grew from community engagement and aimed to increase food security and experiential and place-based education opportunities, ultimately aiding the restoration of ancestral abundance and pathways for self-governance.

Community Mapping (click top-right icon to expand in new window)

Links to Our Partners