Can the land of Oʻahu feed its 900,000 residents? What methods did our Hawaiian ancestors employ to produce food so efficiently? AVA Konohiki is a grant funded by the Administration for Native Americans through the Edith Kanakaʻole Foundation whose objective is researching ancestral knowledge and food sustainability with a focus on the island of Oʻahu.

Students have been harvesting the 1848 Land Commission Awards (8,500 awards) from the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi records in the Hawaiʻi State Archives, and posting them online for the general public and U.H. students to access. They have researched and posted 81 maps from the 1880s for the 81 ahupuaʻa of Oʻahu, so that all can see how the ancestors managed water for efficient food production. They are now indexing the 10,500 testimonies for the 1848 LCAs, as well as indexing the maps.

Besides web work, students also have classes that take them to visit working farms on Oʻahu. Last semester their conclusion was that there is indeed enough land and water on Oʻahu to feed 900,000 residents, but there are not enough people planting food, and we still do not have enough sources of protein on Oʻahu. Our next focus of study will be ancestral fishponds that can produce 200 pounds of fish per acre on an annual basis. In 1895, there were 4,100 acres of fishponds on Oʻahu while today only about 500 acres remain. How do we best utilize these precious resources?