From sprinkles to kabchi : Ethnographic insights on planetary health and the pluriverse from Bhutan

Global health practitioners concerned about ecological damage caused by ‘human civilisation’ increasingly promote the concept of planetary health. However, anthropologists and philosophers warn against a universal planetary imaginary that relies on biomedical technologies and overlooks alternatives to colonial plantation practices of feeding humans in the global South. This study followed early nutrition interventions in Bhutan, a ‘pluriversal’ context not directly colonised. Our multi-sited and multimodal ethnographic work contrasts the use of micronutrient powders called Sprinkles, globally promoted for cost-effective sustainability during the First 1000 Days, with recipes for kabchi , a roasted cereal powder fed to infants and land deities. We show how Sprinkles enact a bioeconomic logic of feeding that was often refused by infants and mothers – suggesting misalignment with local socio-ecologies. In contrast, kabchi enacted a tendre l (interdependent) logic embedded in eco-social land relations and clinical guidelines. Framing these frictions within Indigenous and anticolonial feminist science studies, we call for reimagining planetary health interventions – and human growth – through multidisciplinary research, sciences-from-below and reparative action. This article was published open access under a CC BY 4.0 licence: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ .