scholarly journals Peasants’ Transnational Mobilization for Food Sovereignty in La Vía Campesina

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Delphine Thivet
Keyword(s):  
Food Production ◽  
Food Systems ◽  
Food Sovereignty ◽  
National Level ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Rural Workers ◽  
Global Institutions ◽  
Leading Role ◽  
Food Activism ◽  
La Via Campesina

This paper examines how small farmers and landless rural workers have developed new modes of food activism at the transnational level. It explores in particular how the international peasant movement La Vía Campesina advocates and seeks to build – through the concept of the “food sovereignty” – an alternative frame for food production and distribution enabling communities and people to determine at the local/national level their own food systems. Based on a multi-sited fieldwork including participant observations and interviews with organizations’ members from three different countries involved in La Vía Campesina (France, Brazil and India), my study analyses the various and unstable definitions of the concept of “food sovereignty” in the movement. It examines the process of adding new meanings to its definition according to its circulation across different scales and specific cultural and geographical contexts, its attempted legal translations, and its local reconfigurations in sometimes nationalistic and protectionist ways. The aim is first to show how the demand for “food sovereignty” has emerged at the international level so as to reframe politically global food relations and compete with a more technical response to world hunger promoted by global institutions - the notion of “food security”. The paper then traces the various strategies used by La Vía Campesina’s activists to legitimize and promote their cause, trying to make small-scale farmers “visible” – both in international and national public arenas – and recognized as those assuming a leading role in food production throughout the world. Finally, it addresses the way the food sovereignty framework catalyzes social mobilization across borders by constituting transnational interests and provides to marginalized social agents in the countryside a conceptual frame for making sense of the process of dispossession from the means of production they have been undergoing since the early 1980s.

scholarly journals Envisioning the Future of European Food Systems: Approaches and Research Priorities After COVID-19

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matteo Vittuari ◽  
Giovanni Bazzocchi ◽  
Sonia Blasioli ◽  
Francesco Cirone ◽  
Albino Maggio ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Food Production ◽  
Food Systems ◽  
Food System ◽  
Production Systems ◽  
Food Sovereignty ◽  
Research Priorities ◽  
Policy Framework ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
City Region ◽  
Research And Innovation

The COVID-19 pandemic unveiled the fragility of food sovereignty in cities and confirmed the close connection urban dwellers have with food. Although the pandemic was not responsible for a systemic failure, it suggested how citizens would accept and indeed support a transition toward more localized food production systems. As this attitudinal shift is aligned with the sustainability literature, this work aims to explore the tools and actions needed for a policy framework transformation that recognizes the multiple benefits of food systems, while considering local needs and circumstances. This perspective paper reviews the trends in production and consumption, and systematizes several impacts emerged across European food systems in response to the first wave of pandemic emergency, with the final aim of identifying challenges and future strategies for research and innovation toward the creation of resilient and sustainable city/region food systems. The proposal does not support a return to traditional small-scale economies that might not cope with the growing global population. It instead stands to reconstruct and upscale such connections using a “think globally act locally” mind-set, engaging local communities, and making existing and future citizen-led food system initiatives more sustainable. The work outlines a set of recommended actions for policy-makers: support innovative and localized food production, training and use of information and communication technology for food production and distribution; promote cross-pollination among city/region food systems; empower schools as agents of change in food provision and education about food systems; and support the development of assessment methodologies and the application of policy tools to ensure that the different sustainability dimensions of the food chain are considered.

scholarly journals Beyond Sustainability in Food Systems: Perspectives from Agroecology and Social Innovation

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (18) ◽  
pp. 7524
Author(s):  
Livia Marchetti ◽  
Valentina Cattivelli ◽  
Claudia Cocozza ◽  
Fabio Salbitano ◽  
Marco Marchetti
Keyword(s):  
Food Production ◽  
Food Systems ◽  
Social Innovation ◽  
Food Sovereignty ◽  
Farming Systems ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Economic Relations ◽  
Production Models ◽  
Diversified Farming Systems ◽  
Family Based

Food security faces many multifaceted challenges, with effects ranging far beyond the sectors of agriculture and food science and involving all the multiscale components of sustainability. This paper puts forward our point of view about more sustainable and responsible approaches to food production research underlying the importance of knowledge and social innovation in agroecological practices. Increased demand for food worldwide and the diversification of food choices would suggest the adoption of highly productive, but low-resilient and unsustainable food production models. However, new perspectives are possible. These include the revitalization and valorization of family-based traditional agriculture and the promotion of diversified farming systems as a social and economic basis to foster social-ecological conversion. Additionally, they encompass the forecasting of the Participatory Guarantee Systems (PGS) and the drafting of a new agenda for food sovereignty. Thanks to a desk analysis, the study describes and discusses these perspectives, their trajectories and action research implications. The results suggest the need to adopt a more inclusive and systemic approach to the described problems, as the solutions require the promotion of responsibility within decision makers, professionals and consumers. This appears essential for reading, analyzing and understanding the complex ecological-functional, social and economic relations that characterize farming systems, as well as mobilizing local communities.

The Prism of Expanding Peasants’ Rights: A Critical Investigation of Diverse Frames Applied to La Vía Campesina’s Human Rights Engagements

2018 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 327-340 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pratik Raghu
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Social Justice ◽  
Literature Review ◽  
Sustainable Agriculture ◽  
Food Sovereignty ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Rights Discourse ◽  
Human Rights Discourse ◽  
La Via Campesina ◽  
Critical Investigation

Abstract Since its foundation in 1993, La Vía Campesina has surged to the forefront of the global alter-globalization movement of movements, mobilizing human rights discourse to promote small-scale sustainable agriculture as a key component of social justice, equity, dignity, and autonomy everywhere. This literature review argues that food sovereignty—La Vía Campesina’s best known, rights-based innovation—inflects a range of other interrelated but distinct frames that variously foreground peasants’ rights, “peasantness,” land, cultural recognition, and collective emancipation, prefiguring an array of prospects for the expansion of human rights to peasants and other marginalized populations confronting the failures of capitalist globalization.

scholarly journals Feeding the world healthily: the challenge of measuring the effects of agriculture on health

2010 ◽  
Vol 365 (1554) ◽  
pp. 3083-3097 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sophie Hawkesworth ◽  
Alan D. Dangour ◽  
Deborah Johnston ◽  
Karen Lock ◽  
Nigel Poole ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
International Development ◽  
Population Health ◽  
Food Production ◽  
Food Systems ◽  
Food System ◽  
National Level ◽  
Evidence Base ◽  
Agricultural System ◽  
Double Burden ◽  
Healthy Human

Agricultural production, food systems and population health are intimately linked. While there is a strong evidence base to inform our knowledge of what constitutes a healthy human diet, we know little about actual food production or consumption in many populations and how developments in the food and agricultural system will affect dietary intake patterns and health. The paucity of information on food production and consumption is arguably most acute in low- and middle-income countries, where it is most urgently needed to monitor levels of under-nutrition, the health impacts of rapid dietary transition and the increasing ‘double burden’ of nutrition-related disease. Food availability statistics based on food commodity production data are currently widely used as a proxy measure of national-level food consumption, but using data from the UK and Mexico we highlight the potential pitfalls of this approach. Despite limited resources for data collection, better systems of measurement are possible. Important drivers to improve collection systems may include efforts to meet international development goals and partnership with the private sector. A clearer understanding of the links between the agriculture and food system and population health will ensure that health becomes a critical driver of agricultural change.

scholarly journals Building a safety buffer for European food security: the role of small-scale food production and local ecological and gastronomic knowledge in light of COVID-19

2021 ◽  
Vol 1 ◽  
pp. 10
Author(s):  
Renata Sõukand ◽  
Raivo Kalle ◽  
Michele Filippo Fontefrancesco ◽  
Andrea Pieroni
Keyword(s):  
Food Production ◽  
Food Systems ◽  
Small Firms ◽  
Local Food ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Food Chains ◽  
Community Based ◽  
In The Wild ◽  
Safe Food

The lockdown caused by coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has created a situation in which food availability is affected not only by the availability of money but also by the availability of food itself. On the basis of five pillars, including 1) supporting community-based farming, 2) defending small firms, 3) developing narratives on the high value of local food,4) encouraging subsistence gardening and foraging in the wild, and 5) promoting local ecological and gastronomic knowledge, the article points a way forward to attain greater sustainability and resilience of safe food chains that starts with reassessing the relevance of local food systems.

scholarly journals Transforming Food Systems Through Food Sovereignty: An Australian Urban Context

2015 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 34-45 ◽  
Author(s):  
Federico Davila ◽  
Robert Dyball
Keyword(s):  
Transformative Learning ◽  
Food Production ◽  
Food Systems ◽  
Production Systems ◽  
Food Sovereignty ◽  
Urban Context ◽  
Human Right ◽  
Alternative Food Systems ◽  
Environmental Support ◽  
Urban Food Production

AbstractThis article draws on La Via Campesina's definition of food sovereignty and its potential for reconceptualising food as a basic human right within the dominant Australian food discourse. We argue that the educative value that emerges from urban food production in Australia stems from the action of growing food and its capacity to transform individuals’ social and environmental concerns over food systems. Community participation in urban food production can promote a learning process that generates political understanding and concerns over food systems. We use the education theories of transformative learning and critical consciousness to discuss how Australian urban food production systems can create this social and environmental support for alternative food systems. By having control over food production practices and building collective understandings of how food choices impact global food systems, elements of food sovereignty can develop in an Australian urban context.

scholarly journals Building a safety buffer for European food security: the role of small-scale food production and local ecological and gastronomic knowledge in light of COVID-19

2021 ◽  
Vol 1 ◽  
pp. 10
Author(s):  
Renata Sõukand ◽  
Raivo Kalle ◽  
Michele Filippo Fontefrancesco ◽  
Andrea Pieroni
Keyword(s):  
Food Production ◽  
Food Systems ◽  
Small Firms ◽  
Local Food ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Food Chains ◽  
Community Based ◽  
In The Wild ◽  
Safe Food

The lockdown caused by the coronavirus 2019 disease (COVID-19) has created a situation in which food availability is affected not only by the availability of money but also by the availability of food itself. On the basis of five pillars, including 1) supporting community-based farming, 2) defending small firms, 3) developing narratives on the high value of local food, 4) encouraging subsistence gardening and foraging in the wild, and 5) promoting local ecological and gastronomic knowledge, the essay points a way forward to attain greater sustainability and resilience of safe food chains that starts with reassessing the relevance of local food systems.

scholarly journals Market Dependency as Prohibitive of Agroecology and Food Sovereignty—A Case Study of the Agrarian Transition in the Scottish Highlands

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 1927
Author(s):  
Elise Wach
Keyword(s):  
Food Systems ◽  
Food Sovereignty ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
Scottish Highlands ◽  
Agrarian Transition

While there have been calls amongst the more ‘political’ or ‘radical’ agroecology and food sovereignty advocates for a break from capitalist food systems, conceptualisations of capitalism, and thus counter-capitalism, vary widely. The movements have largely presented small-scale producers and peasants as alternatives to industrial food systems, and have focused on reducing input dependency as a path towards autonomy of producers and the realisation of agroecological food systems. An alternative to this approach is presented here through applying Ellen M. Wood’s conceptualisation of capitalism as characterised by ‘market dependency’ to the case of the agrarian transition in the Scottish Highlands. This article demonstrates the specific ways in which market dependency, including for agricultural outputs, not just inputs, leads to a divergence from agroecological food systems. It argues that identifying ‘market dependency’ as a defining characteristic of capitalism could strengthen and refine the focus of agroecology and food sovereignty movements.

scholarly journals STRATEGIC DEVELOPMENT AREAS OF THE REGIONAL AGRI-FOOD SYSTEMS IN THE CONTEXT OF PROVISION OF FOOD SAFETY OF THE POPULATION

2021 ◽  
Vol 31 (6) ◽  
pp. 1001-1009
Author(s):  
A.I. Sutygina ◽  
A.V. Ovchinnikova ◽  
A.A. Bratsikhin
Keyword(s):  
Food Safety ◽  
Food Systems ◽  
Food Sovereignty ◽  
National Level ◽  
Food Prices ◽  
State Regulation ◽  
The State ◽  
Rural Settlements ◽  
Economic Sectors ◽  
Self Sufficiency

Strategic goal of agri-food systems development (AFS) is provision of food safety of the country. This predetermines food sovereignty of the country on the national level. It is important for regions to achieve self-sufficiency in food. Food safety of each country resident is characterized by the balanced and quality nutrition in the volume no less than the norm of rational consumption. To achieve the food sovereignty on every of the above-mentioned levels, it's necessary to have stable development of the regional agri-food systems where the demand, supply and consumption of the food products form. Functioning of AFS is connected with the efficiency of agri-food production, its competitiveness, trading networks activity, population incomes and participance of the state in the forming of food supply and the demand. The role of the state regulation consists in the forming of conditions for the stable functioning of all its sub-systems, provision of physical, economic and social availability of the food. In conditions of the differentiation of the regions by social and economical development, the level of the population incomes and food prices are varied significantly. This stipulates different levels of the affordability of the food. Besides, economic inequality is noted not only among regions, but also among the employees of different economic sectors, as well as residents of city and rural settlements. In these conditions self-provision of the population with food is a factor of increase of the nutrition quality, and the realization of the excess is a source of additional incomes. State support of the owners of private part-owner units, activity of trading and purchasing consumer co-operatives contribute to the growth of self-sufficiency of the villagers with food.

scholarly journals Towards Territorially Embedded, Equitable and Resilient Food Systems? Insights from Grassroots Responses to COVID-19 in Italy and the City Region of Rome

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (5) ◽  
pp. 2425
Author(s):  
Simona Zollet ◽  
Luca Colombo ◽  
Paola De De Meo ◽  
Davide Marino ◽  
Steven R. McGreevy ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Food Systems ◽  
Food System ◽  
Food Sovereignty ◽  
Alternative Food Networks ◽  
Small Scale ◽  
System Transformation ◽  
City Region ◽  
The Face ◽  
Negative Impacts ◽  
The City

The negative impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic have further exposed and exacerbated the structural weaknesses and inequalities embedded in the global industrial agri-food system. While the mainstream narrative continues to emphasise the importance of ensuring the uninterrupted functioning of global supply chains to counter COVID-related disruptions, the pandemic has also highlighted the resilience of small-scale, sustainable family farming and of spatially and socially embedded food systems. Based on a quantitative and qualitative analysis of three surveys, this study examines organic and agroecological farmers’ responses to the first COVID-related lockdown (March–May 2020) in Italy, as well as the responses of grassroots alternative food networks (AFN) in the city region of Rome. The results show how local grassroots action played a significant role in ensuring food access, provisioning, and distribution, often in the face of delayed or insufficient action of mainstream food system actors and institutions. These grassroots responses identify opportunities and barriers for agri-food system transformation away from neoliberal, market-based interventions and towards policies that support food sovereignty and democracy in the context of localised, agroecology-based and more resilient agri-food systems.

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