Özet:

In recent years policies and projects that recognize the indigenous ecological knowledge of rural women in order to prevent increasing environmental disasters such as climate change, global warming, carbon emissions and encourage women’s entrepreneurship in order to bring their this cultural potential to national economy are becoming increasingly widespread both in all over the world and also in our country. These initiatives highlight the concept of to “Traditional Ecological/Environmental Knowledge (TEK)” or “Local/Indigenous Knowledge” in relevant literature which points to the importance and protection of local ecological knowledge and reveal the close connection of rural women with this popular concept In this research, this close relationship between rural women and TEK has also been analyzed as a result of the data obtained through the interviews conducted with the President of Ankara Afşar Balam Women Cooperative which sets a typical example of aforementioned initiatives women cooperatives in Turkey and it has been discovered that these formal organizations also make rural women’s knowledge about eco-system, local resources and cultural values visible. Moreover, it has also been noticed that these organizations can assume a role of reminding them this knowledge that is sunk to oblivion forgotten to women. It has been noticed that through these organizations that has been shaped under the integration of Industry-agriculture, Anatolian women are able to recall what was excluded as unvaluable, primitive or irrational by acting a bridge(catalyzor) with their bodies, memories and words between the old and the modern technics, traditional and scientific knowledge, the national and the local and can reproduce it as a functional “hybrid method”. This study based on qualitative research method was prepared according to the datas obtained through three meetings with the President of Cooperative one of which was face to face meeting via zoom platform and the others was done by writing through a message app. In the light of obtained datas, it has discovered that women’s cooperatives have functions that mobilize rural women’s potential to produce “hybrid knowledge” and raises awareness of both women and rural population about eco-identity and values of their geography.