Biodiversity is a natural wealth and a fact shows that they exist in Central Bengkulu, starting from roots, stems, leaves, and flowers, to fruits and seeds. This wealth is supported by its fertile soil and stable weather conditions, year-round rain, and a minimum of pollutants. Central Bengkulu is a new regency however, it is able to fulfill food needs. Several rivers flow through the area and it has agricultural land that can be planted all year round.

Over time, Central Bengkulu pursued the development of Bengkulu City and North Bengkulu. According to Yohanes Dian Alpasa, the domination of physical development of the Bengkulu City and the rubber factories and palm fruit processing have affected Central Bengkulu in consumption, planting, and business habits as well. People tend to favor instant products which are cheaper and easier to obtain.

According to Reginiana, as stated in the Stube-HEMAT Central Bengkulu weekly discussion (29/01/2023), many housewives tend to choose instant spices because they are more practical and easy to store. Indeed, for big needs such as wedding parties, spices, and grains are purchased from the market. However, the demand for events like this is relatively rare. Even for planting, there are not many places available because part of the land has already been planted with rubber and oil palm.

Stube-HEMAT Bengkulu strengthens young people to care more about biodiversity.  As we have already felt this anxiety toward dependency on a particular food product. We are facing difficulties growing corn and rice, so corn and rice are imported from abroad. This can be considered as a threat because the supply can be stopped at any time by the exporting parties.

One participant told that his parents had just brought ginger from Rejang Lebong Regency. Processed foods such as snacks are also distributed from outside Central Bengkulu, so the biodiversity and cooking process need to be remembered again. On this occasion, Reginiana reminded the participants to start identifying plants and how to process them in Central Bengkulu. In the future they can develop and cultivate plants needed for food self-sufficiency and how to process them. Processed products can later be used for self-consumption or traded to the surrounding community.

Participants were asked to recall staple food and plants that can be found in Central Bengkulu, for example, gadung, gembili, sorghum, local corn, brackish water rice, sweet potatoes, lumpeh beans, durian, and snakehead fish. They tried to remember some types of edible leaves and flowers even though they do not know their names.

At the end of the discussion, the participants were asked to recall the types of processed food they had consumed. Several local food plant materials are listed and used for discussion material in the following meeting. ***