Is Quinoa the Next Oil?

A country trying to getting rich from oil is commonplace. But quinoa?

I’ve been teaching people how to cook quinoa (a seed that’s usually identified as a grain) for several years and have seen its popularity explode over the past decade. And why not? Quinoa is delicious, extremely nutritious and easy to make.

A recent Associated Press article detailed how Bolivia’s government is trying to turn quinoa into a cash crop:

Quinoa's rising popularity among First World foodies — the wholesale price has jumped sevenfold since 2000 as global demand climbed — has been a boon to the poor farmers here in the semiarid highlands where most of it grows.

And that boom has transformed the lives of the largely subsistence farmers who grow it, though it remains unclear whether the large-scale commercial cultivation sought by Bolivia's government is environmentally sustainable in the altiplain— or even welcome by growers.

Click here to read the entire article.