The social and cultural side of raised field agriculture is understood less than the technology. While most Quechua and Aymara farmers immediately recognize the benefits of raised field agriculture, the majority have not permanently adopted it as a production strategy. During a brief evaluation of raised field rehabilitation projects in 1989, we found that the reasons for non-adoption are complex and fascinating . The most important factor is that the social, political, and economic
environment today is different from that when the raised fields were first constructed and used. Other important factors are competing labor demands, traditional fallow cycles, crop genetic loss, competition with livestock, land tenure issues, limited NGO knowledge of the technology,misuse of incentives, political unrest, and emphasis on communal farming rather than the individual farmer.