Food Networks Research Articles

Examining proximity factors in public-private collaboration models for sustainable agri-food system transformation: a comparative study of two rural communities

Collaboration among local actors is considered an important precondition for a sustainable transformation of the regional agri-food system. To date, however, little is known about the social innovation capacity of local farmers when it comes to the establishment of alternative food networks. This is especially true for farmers’ collaborations with local government officials, which are becoming increasingly important in establishing sustainability-oriented markets for local products and services, especially in the agricultural sector that is often rooted in rigid logics, supply chains and institutions. Therefore, this paper aims to explore the concept of proximity as an analytical lens to understand private-public collaboration models that aim at facilitating sustainable transformation in rural areas. Drawing on concepts from innovation geography, this paper considers the influence of geographic, cognitive, institutional, organizational and social determinants of collaboration, enabling an evaluation of the social innovation capacity of local private and public actors. This theoretical approach helps to disassemble and differentiate social innovation processes to determine success strategies. The paper studies two rural communities where mayors aim to establish local food stores with regional products and, therefore, seek collaboration with local farmers. While the empirical aspect of the study is limited, the two cases provide an opportunity to test the theoretical framework. The proximity approach can be significant for regional agri-food system transformation and steering social innovation processes by considering the distinct capacities of actors. Our conclusion is that the examination of the absence and degree of proximity facilitates a better understanding of practical recommendations to promote agri-food system transformation.

The contested politics of food banking in the United States

ABSTRACT Rising out of the devolution of public services to private actors during the Reagan administration, the food banking economy in the United States is now a multi-billion-dollar industry. The social and political movements that institutionalized charitable food networks are diverse and often contradictory, offering a window into the politics and competing interests of a U.S. food system that has long grappled with glaring contradictions between food waste and hunger. In this paper, I analyze shifting moral economies of hunger relief within a diverse social movement (re)negotiating a set of legal codes and social norms established over the past forty years of hunger relief through charity. I argue that charitable food networks offer a window into the political contest currently unfolding over the future of the U.S. food system. As such, the debates within these spaces are critical to understand the broader politics of food provisioning in the United States.

Beyond motivations: A framework unraveling the systemic barriers to organic farming adoption in northern Senegal

Developing organic farming is among the most popular policy options for protecting soil, water, and biodiversity while improving incomes for agricultural producers around the World. Despite its growing success, the adoption as well as the outcomes of organic agriculture remain particularly low in sub-Saharan Africa. In this paper, we propose a multidimensional framework based on farmers' perceived motivations to evaluate the factors enabling or hindering the adoption of organic agriculture, including attitude (the subjective evaluation of a behaviour), ability (the cognitive and technical capacity to perform a behaviour), opportunity (the perceived social, economic, and ecological benefits of a behaviour), and legitimacy (formal and informal values and norms supporting a behaviour). We tested the framework on a sample of around 300 organic and conventional small-scale farmers in a horticultural area in northern Senegal. We found that despite a highly positive attitude towards organic practices among both conventional and organic farmers, adoption remains extremely low, and many have abandoned them. Low perceived ability and a lack of opportunities appeared to be determinant drivers, including difficulties accessing available organic input, knowledge, and tools and lack of both a market and institutional support. Our results suggest that greater emphasis should be placed on creating favourable conditions at the food system level based on broad agroecological principles. This can be achieved, for example, by supporting grassroots farmer organizations, enacting appropriate environmental legislation, securing organic farmers’ productive resources, and enhancing participatory organic certification and alternative food networks. Such efforts are likely to have a more significant impact than training and promotion targeting farmers who are already convinced.

Linking Parasite, People and Places: The Food Networks of Liver Fluke Infection

One of the top ten foodborne parasitic infections of global concern is human infection of liver fluke through the consumption of raw or undercooked freshwater fish. This article examines the influences of human–environmental interactions of raw fish sharing and procurement connections on the geographic variation in liver fluke infection. We first discuss the networks embedded in the parasite life cycle that propagates disease transmission. Then, we collect 820 questionnaires from three provinces in northeast Thailand to visualize their fish-sharing and sharing-procurement networks, analyze how the connectivity differences in these networks might be linked to participants’ consumption behaviors and environmental settings, and determine how all these together affect liver fluke infection risks. The results show that infection was positively associated with procuring fish from ponds, but negatively associated with procuring fish from rivers. Incorporating fish procurement sites substantially increases network connectivity, reinforcing the human connection to key fish sources as a potential risk factor for infection. The consideration of the connections between human, disease hosts, and the environment, compared to the previously human-centric approach of deworming, offers new insights for public health intervention.

Sustainability and the politics of the body in alternative food consumption: An embodied materialist perspective

Health is a key dimension of contemporary food consumption. This preoccupation is beginning to overlap with ecological concerns, as healthy diets are said to largely correspond with sustainable diets. Nevertheless, this link remains rather vague and under-researched in practice. This article adopts an ‘embodied materialist’ perspective to inquire into how the health–sustainability nexus is articulated in the everyday labour of people engaging in alternative food consumption. The interviews, carried out in Milan (Italy), suggest that focusing on health might not always be straightforwardly effective for the promotion of deep and systemic changes. The analysis finds three ways in which the health–sustainability nexus is articulated in daily life. If framed within the dominant articulation of labour and value, health is an individualistic preoccupation with limited potential for socio-ecological transformation. When food labour is guided by the very different logic of care, which emphasises relationality, fragility and the search for a shared wellbeing, more ecological practices emerge, but with some ambivalent implications especially with regards to social justice. Collective engagement in alternative food networks politicises the body more deeply, making it a concrete site of struggle against unsustainable food regimes.

Polanyi and the Other Alternative Food Network: What San Francisco‐Based Multi‐Level Marketers of “Healthy” Food Tell Us About Values in Market Societies

AbstractRecent decades have witnessed the proliferation of alternative food networks (AFNs) in the US and Europe. While social scientists classify heterogenous practices as AFNs, their participants share the desire to work against the existing food system, and efforts to access food from outside this system. Many analysts have captured these features of AFNs by using concepts from Karl Polanyi's The Great Transformation. Yet while Polanyi's framework has been productive, it has also contributed to binary representations of alternative food movements as either advancing non‐market values or in service to commodification and hegemony. We scrutinize San Francisco‐based independent contractors who sell food alternatives and health supplements produced by a multi‐level marketing company we call NatureRise. The marketers of NatureRise products are committed to working against an industrial food system that they consider corrupt. They promote food alternatives that they regard as more natural than food in the conventional system, and embed sales in face‐to‐face relations in which a family‐like concern for human wellbeing is expressed. Yet, they also engage in sales for what Polanyi calls “the motive of gain.” Our case highlights a shortcoming in Polanyi's thought, one that characterizes many social analyses, while supporting the continued relevance of his work.

A Methodological Proposal for the Design of Agricultural Parks—The Case of Metropolitan City of Rome

Urbanisation processes have led to the emergence of functional and formal hybrids, blurring and fragmenting the traditional boundaries between urban and rural areas. Agricultural parks have emerged as a planning tool to govern these hybrid areas between ‘countryside’ and the ‘city’, as well as to promote sustainable land use and community development. This paper, analysing the Metropolitan City of Rome (Italy) as a case study, illustrates an innovative pilot methodology for identifying the area of an Agricultural Park and, in particular, the area of the Rome Metropolitan Agricultural Park (MAP), a policy proposal for the metropolitan city. The aim of the article is twofold: to analyse the multifunctionality of farms in the periurban area of Rome to highlight the types of goods and services on which the relationship between farms and the metropolitan population is based and to expose the methodological path on which the MAP policy proposal was developed. A geospatial analysis, using the National Land Consumption Map (LCM) and the CORINE Land Cover (CLC), highlights the main agricultural areas and evaluates their quality. Isochronous curves assess the accessibility, and the GHS population grid (GHS-POP) defines the catchment areas. This approach, building on the 15 min city framework, has analysed the multifunctional farms and the types of goods and services offered to the population. A total of 91,656 hectares were identified as potential geographical areas of the Metropolitan Agricultural Park that could serve nearly 1 million inhabitants between rural and urban areas of Rome. The research highlights its characteristics in terms of the role of multifunctional farms, Alternative Food Networks, and the relationships between consumers and producers.

Actualizations of agroecology among Scottish farmers

ABSTRACT Transformative agroecology challenges industrialized food and farming systems, proposing an alternative vision in which farms are designed around ecological symbioses and embedded within socially just food networks. However, at a policy level, alternative conceptualizations of agroecology have emerged that emphasize on-farm efficiency gains but lack broader objectives of agroecosystem and food system transformation. This phenomenological inquiry explores the agroecological narrative among Scottish farmers and considers its impacts on agroecosystem and food system change. Interviews were conducted across 15 farms in Scotland (20 participants) following the trans positional cognition approach (TPCA). Actualizations of agroecology were found to be value-driven approaches to developing individualized, lower-input farming systems. All farms were attempting to influence agroecosystem change through the application of ecological principles, and most (11/15) were contributing to food system change directly through involvement in alternative food networks. Smaller-scale farmers appear to deliver the most authentic actualizations of transformative agroecology but emphasized more strongly their financial challenges. A key recommendation for policymakers is to strengthen the support mechanisms available for small-scale ecological agriculture.

Growing in relation with the land: Experiential learning of Root and Regenerate Urban Farms

The food landscape of Calgary, Canada, is sown with an abundance of polycultures. Alongside place-specific Indigenous foodways are food rescue, banking, and hamper programs, food studies scholars, a City of Calgary food resilience plan, and a growing number of alternative food network producers. Within the local alternative food network, there has been a boom in advancing indoor growing for our colder climate, including container, aquaponic, vertical hydroponic, and greenhouse growing. Situated as an agrarian ethno­grapher and an urban regenerative farmer, we seek to highlight the viability of agricultural techniques that are in relation with the land to grow more socially and ecologically sustainable food and farm systems in and around Calgary. From this posi­tion, we formed a collaboration between the University of Calgary, Root and Regenerate Urban Farms, and the Young Agrarians to document the cultivation process for a production urban farm. Over the course of one growing season—May to September, 2021—we harvested approximately 7,000 lbs (3,175 kg) of produce across nine urban spaces totaling 0.26 acres. The 48 vegetable varie­ties were distributed to 35 community supported agriculture shareholders, weekly farmers market customers, restaurant chefs, and members of the YYC Growers and Distributors cooperative. More­over, we donated 765 lbs (347 kg) of surplus pro­duce to the Calgary Community Fridge, Calgary Food Bank, and the Alex Community Food Cen­tre, which work to mitigate food insecurity. Through a reflexive practitioner approach, our reflective essay discusses the benefits and limita­tions of Small Plot Intensive Farming methods and urban land-sharing strategies, as well as the viability of land-based urban agriculture in a rapidly chang­ing socio-ecological climate. Our paper also demonstrates the potential for transcending siloed approaches to knowledge-making vis-à-vis experi­ential learning partnerships between graduate student researchers, farmers, and agricultural organizations.

Food Networks and Agroecology in the Province of Trento – Italy

As the hegemonic food system is unsustainable in socio-environmental terms, over the last few decades, the search for new forms of food supply has fostered alternative food networks (AFNs). Civic Food Networks (CFNs) are a particular subset of AFNs that strongly emphasise the citizenship of the actors involved, including farmers, and their active engagement in the agrifood system. Our objective was to identify CFNs within the studied territory, evaluate farmers’ participation, and answer if the CFNs are contributing to the promotion of agroecology. The research comprises a case study in the province of Trento (Italy). We used direct and participant observation, database consulting, document analysis, and interviews with key players and organic farmers linked to short food supply chains (SFSCs). We evaluated the contributions to the promotion of agroecology through ecological and socioeconomic elements: biodiversity, efficient use of resources, and self-produced food. We have identified the presence of initiatives that act by promoting discussion spaces and stimulating the construction of experiences of an SFSC. Those initiatives have provided space for the formation of new networks and created opportunities for new relationships, production, and consumption networks. However, organisational structures that favour monocultural systems and commercialisation in long chains prevail in the territory and hinder these innovations. Though the collective organisations of farmers, outside the formal cooperatives, are still developing, farmers are often individualised and with little active participation in decision-making processes within the territory. This study identified an embryonic CFN that showed positive indicators of agroecology for all the analysed aspects. However, the differences were not as significant when compared to other farmers who also participated in SFSCs. This research reinforces that there is a there is promotion of agroecoloy, from the maintenance and encouragement of short food supply chains that are proponents of agrobiodiversity, to the maintenance of family farmers’ livelihoods. CFNs have the potential to empower rural actors by providing them with greater participation and autonomy in the agrifood system. However, strengthening these networks remains a challenge, as it requires stimulating social organisation and fostering the integration of various actors within the territory, including rural stakeholders.

Large size heat pumps advanced cost functions introducing the impact of design COP on capital costs

Power-to-heat technologies offer low-carbon heat and integrate electricity and heating sectors. Moreover, high-temperature heat pumps can supply process heat for industries, like food, and feed early district heating networks. However, their viability is often jeopardized by high capital costs. Fluid selection affects variable and capital (TCI) costs, impacting the Coefficient of Performance (COP) and equipment sizing. Therefore, identifying the best fluid and estimating capital costs with simple and reliable cost functions are crucial for assessing heat pump market opportunities. This paper presents a multi-objective optimization, based on a detailed technoeconomic model, to find the optimal heat pump solution for different applications. Moreover, the proposed Pareto analysis is employed to derive new cost functions considering the working fluid, source/supply temperatures, and the impact of design COP on TCI, with a formulation facilitating understanding and quantification of each factor. This methodology promotes heat pump adoption in industrial electrification, especially for high-temperature applications, potentially replacing natural gas boilers. Three case studies demonstrate the robustness of the approach to assessing capital costs, showing low deviation (<8%) between the detailed technoeconomic model and the fast-to-applicate new cost functions. The innovative cost functions ensure easy but accurate assessments, fostering confidence in transitioning to heat pump solutions.

Beyond social embeddedness: probing the power relations of alternative food networks in China

Beyond social embeddedness: probing the power relations of alternative food networks in China

Producers’ transition to alternative food practices in rural China: social mobilization and cultural reconstruction in the formation of alternative economies

The shift from the conventional agri-food system to alternative practices is a challenging transition for agricultural producers, yet surprisingly under-studied. Little research has examined the social and cultural processes in rural communities that mobilize producers and construct and sustain producer-driven alternative food networks (AFNs). For AFNs to go beyond just offering “alternative foods” or “alternative networks” and to be constructed as “alternative economies”, this transformation in the producer community is indispensable. This paper presents a case study of a rural cooperative in Shanxi, China. The discontent with both productivist agriculture and the social decay in communities motivated a group of women to engage in a decade-long process of social mobilization, cultural reconstruction, and learning by experimentation. Through this, they developed an alternative vision and successfully created a localized alternative socio-economic model, which I call “anti-productivism”. It prioritizes ecological sustainability, self-reliance, reciprocity, and cultural values over output maximization, productivity growth, commodity exchange, and monetary gains. This case contrasts sharply with the urban-initiated, consumer-driven AFNs studied in the China literature, which mostly just offered alternative foods but brought little change to the producer community. It shows that the alternative economy must be embedded in an alternative community united by strong social bonds and shared cultural values.

Synthesising the diversity of European agri-food networks: A meta-study of actors and power-laden interactions

Farmers are at the centre of scientific and political debates about sustainability in European agriculture, but rarely do we discuss the roles of other actors who shape their behaviour. Understanding the interactions and balance of power in agri-food systems is critical to effectively govern sustainability transitions. Here, we conduct a meta-study of 71 case studies in European agri-food systems to synthesise evidence on the diversity of actors and network configurations. We characterise the reported power-laden relationships to generate an agri-food network for each case study and then create a typology of archetypical network configurations. Our study provides three major insights. First, we find a diverse range of actors and complex network configurations. This indicates that the predominant focus on farmers in sustainability policy overlooks the other actors in their agri-food networks, thus risking suboptimal policy design and efficacy. Second, the typology identifies three groups of networks – agro-industrial control, multifunctional value chains, and civic food networks – associated with diverging levels of farmer autonomy. Agricultural governance should therefore consider the context-specific agency of farmers; policies that target farmer decision-making can only have impact if farmers have the capacity to change. Third, the typology demonstrates the potentially complementary roles of conventional and alternative value chains, as well as top-down state support and bottom-up civil society mobilisation. Agri-food networks hence provide diverse leverage points for sustainability transformation.

Exploring food intake networks and anhedonia symptoms in a Chilean Adults sample

Introductionhigh-calorie and sugar-sweetened food is considered more pleasant food. People with anhedonia symptoms have difficulties experiencing pleasure in daily activities. However, is still unclear if anhedonia symptomatology increases palatable food consumption in the Chilean Adults sample. Objectiveto explore food networks in the Chilean Adults sample and in people with anhedonia symptom. Methodsthe sample was recruited through digital platforms. Pregnant or lactating women and subjects under pharmacological treatment or psychotherapy were excluded. A total of 1242 subjects, 76.6% women, with a mean age of 30.7 (SD 9.3) and who were highly educated, participated in the study. Data were collected through an online survey. A questionnaire on food consumption based on daily and weekly frequency was used, as well as the Snaith-Hamilton Pleasure Scale to measure anhedonia symptoms. We employed the Gaussian graph model (GGM) to analyze food consumption as networks. We started with the total sample, and then we repeated the analysis on a subsample with anhedonia symptoms, and next on a subsample with exclusively food-related anhedonia. Resultsin the total sample, a positive and strong relationship was observed between fruits and vegetables, as well as a negative association with the triad of sugar-sweetened beverages, fast food, and fried food. The network in anhedonic subjects shows that “pasta, rice & potatoes” and “bread” have a stronger association and a more central place in the network compared those without anhedonia symptoms. ConclusionsSubjects with anhedonia symptoms have a more central consumption of foods with a high or medium glycemic index compared to subjects without anhedonia symptoms, which could trigger the development of chronic diet-related diseases.

Ecological Network Analysis of the Water-Energy-Food Metabolic System Based on the MRIO Model: A Case Study for China’s Yangtze River Delta Region

Water, energy, and food are essential resources for social and economic development, which are highly interwoven in the urban metabolic processes. The 2011 Bonn conference first introduced the concept of water-energy-food (WEF) nexus to describe the interconnection of three resources. In this study, taking the Yangtze River Delta region as a case study, we proposed a hybrid framework to quantify WEF consumption based on an environmentally extended multiregional input-output model. Then, various ecological network analyses were adopted to explore system properties and sectoral interaction. The results indicate that embodied WEF consumption in interregional trade is highly interconnected, in which Jiangsu accounts for the largest proportion of hybrid energy network, while Anhui dominates the hybrid water network and the food network. The recycling rate in the water network (14.5%–20.8%) is lower than that in the energy network (16.7%–23.5%) and the food network (17.2%–23.9%). Predation and exploitation relationships are dominated between sectors, and the whole trade network stays in a low positive environment. The nexus impact on water networks is smaller than that on the energy networks. This analysis may help identify leverage points and feasible pathways of crossregional resources’ trade and provide insights for integrated resources management of the Yangtze River Delta region.

The Work that Work does: How intrinsic and instrumental values are transformed into relational values through active work participation in Swiss community supported agriculture

Abstract Community supported agriculture (CSA) is an alternative food network that aims to enable sustainable and just food production by bringing consumers and producers together. One version of CSA (Solidarische Landwirtschaft in German or Solidarity Agriculture) requires active labour participation of members as part of the subscription price. This paper uses a relational values approach to explore what motivates members to join and participate in solidarity agriculture cooperatives and how the experience of participation changes their values and behaviour. Qualitative interviews were conducted with 21 members of three co‐operatives and analysed using a grounded theory approach. Specifically, we applied the Syntax of Environmental Values Framework, developed by Deplazes‐Zemp and Chapman. Results show that members typically hold strong intrinsic values regarding fair compensation for farmer's work and local environmental sustainability and instrumental values regarding food quality and healthy eating. We found that participation and work practices at the cooperative added to and changed values and behaviour through new relational connections to food, farmers and to nature via the agricultural landscape. These findings provide new insight into the ways that relational values can be adopted and more broadly on the relationship between values and behaviour. This paper concludes that values, especially relational values, can form and change through lived experiences. Our results can help guide programs aiming to foster pro‐environmental values in a local population by highlighting one possible mechanism to do so. Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.

How Fast-Food Create an Impact on Youth Culture: In Dhanmondi

This study aimed at food without which no human being can live. Food has been a part of our life since the beginning of civilization. However, there have been changes in the taste of food from decade to decade. One of the significant changes that have occurred in the arena of food culture is due to Globalization. Furthermore, it has brought about immense changes in the intervention of fast-food restaurants everywhere in the world. Although, there are some of the factors have shaped the global food chains that emerged as a result of borderless communication and a free market economy. As a consequence, the food chains have given rise to the localization of global food culture. On the other hand, some local chains have emerged by the influence of global food networks. With time, the emergence of these restaurants has changed the pattern of consumption of the youth and the food habit of the whole people of all ages, particularly among youths. Nowadays, the consumption of traditional foods is being replaced by the mass concentration of these restaurants. This study employs a quantitative method that takes purposive sampling to select the population. Data were collected by using the online survey method. A total of 100 samples were collected from the people who consume foods in restaurants. The study results show that the young generation tends to be more influenced by the global food culture. Factors that contribute to their changing behavior patterns of consumption are the internet, social media, T.V., and peer groups. Most youths in Dhanmondi Area mainly tend to look for their favorite meal on different social media sites. The study concludes that how fast food has influenced the youth culture regarding the traditional food consumption by the youths focusing mainly in the Dhanmondi area.

Reviving Urban Greening in Post-Industrial Landscapes: The Case of Turin

This paper explores the strategies for reviving urban greening in post-industrial landscapes through nature-based solutions (NbSs). The case of Turin was selected to investigate peri-urban farming practices at the old FIAT premises in the Mirafiori Sud area. Starting in the 2010s, the City of Turin launched new urban regeneration projects to transform degraded post-industrial landscapes into creative urban living labs (ULLs) for experimentation. The data were collected by reviewing the literature available from public sources, including project documents (deliverables, public reports, MOOC content, scientific articles, etc.). Interviews and focus groups with policymakers (municipality), volunteers (NGOs), and inhabitants were carried out to gather insights as primary sources. A qualitative thematic analysis was adopted to determine how NbS can be a force for enhancing multi-functionality in post-industrial areas by incorporating ULLs and green tourism as a co-creation model to connect with nature. The results showed that (1) Mirafiori Sud became a remarkable hub for co-creation projects to foster the transformation of brownfields into experimentation sites capable of hosting sustainable and inclusive solutions, (2) regenerative art practices in shared spaces play a crucial role in community engagement, (3) the support for urban agriculture initiatives could improve the ability of cities to provide alternative food (and cultural) networks. In sum, NbSs drive change in urban landscapes and promote green tourism via agricultural production.

The natural wine phenomenon and the promise of sustainability: Institutionalization or radicalization?

AbstractNatural wine is produced with organic grapes without the use of additives. As a social phenomenon, it comprises rural winemakers and urban consumers interconnected by a vibrant global community of distributors, bloggers, experts, and associations. Despite its continuous growth since the early 2000s, the movement has sparked global public interest since the French recognition of the vin méthode nature certification in 2020. Here we delineate the evolution of the natural wine phenomenon from its origins to its current situation. It will be argued that rather than a social movement or an alternative food network, natural wine can be better understood as a food phenomenon exhibiting a sustainable alternative mode of production and consumption that unites a loose coalition of diverse actors. In exploring the constant tensions involved in the ongoing redefinition of natural wine by social actors, we will analyze their different understandings of locality, naturalness, and ethical food production.