Alternative Food Networks in Food System Transition—Values, Motivation, and Capacity Building among Young Swedish Market Gardeners

This study sheds light on a new generation of Swedish food producers, market gardeners, who are attracting attention in terms of food system sustainability, prompted by increasing consumer awareness about the value of healthy and locally produced food. Market gardening is part of a global agroecological movement opposed to industrialized agriculture and its negative impacts on the environment and rural communities. These food producers challenge the incumbent agri-food regime through the building of alternative food networks. This case-based study involving 14 young vegetable producers showed that young people who engage in market gardening are strongly motivated by dual incentives, namely entrepreneurship and transformation to sustainability. Six main competences were identified as important for market gardeners: practical skills related to growing vegetables, business management, innovation and continuous learning, systems thinking, pioneering, and networking. Individuals develop their skills through continuous experiential learning and gain knowledge through peer-to-peer learning using social media. However, they need to acquire certain skills relating to their daily work in the field and to managing a business. Market gardeners currently face a number of barriers erected by the sociopolitical environment, in particular regarding access to research-based knowledge, extension services, and business support.

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Online and On-Site Interactions within Alternative Food Networks: Sustainability Impact of Knowledge-Sharing Practices

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su11051457 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 11 (5) ◽

pp. 1457 ◽

Cited By ~ 19

Author(s):

Paola De Bernardi ◽

Alberto Bertello ◽

Francesco Venuti

Keyword(s):

Knowledge Sharing ◽

Social Impact ◽

Food System ◽

Special Kind ◽

Alternative Food ◽

Alternative Food Networks ◽

Farmers Market ◽

Quantitative Studies ◽

Production Distribution ◽

Food Networks

The sustainability debate in the food sector has exposed the current food system to critics, encouraging the significant growth of Alternative Food Networks (AFNs), new ways of food production, distribution and consumption that aim to shorten the food chain. Our study is focused on Food Assembly (FA), a special kind of AFN combining the culture of social entrepreneurship and digital innovation to achieve sustainability and a high social impact. The coexistence of a digital platform and a weekly farmers’ market triggers, within this network, mechanisms of knowledge sharing and self-organisation. To date, however, few studies have focused simultaneously on online and on-site interactions within AFNs, especially with quantitative studies. Our paper aims to test the hypothesis that online and on-site knowledge sharing affects the success of a FA measured by customer sustainable behaviour change. To do so, we developed a quantitative analysis based on a regression model. We collected data via a questionnaire submitted to 8497 Italian FA customers, of which 2115 responses were included in our analysis. The results show that online knowledge sharing significantly affects customer change towards more sustainable purchasing and consumption behaviours, while on-site knowledge sharing positively affects sustainable purchasing behaviours.

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For food space: theorizing alternative food networks beyond alterity

Journal of Political Ecology ◽

10.2458/v27i1.23026 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 27 (1) ◽

pp. 1

Author(s):

Renata Blumberg ◽

Helga Leitner ◽

Kirsten Valentine Cadieux

Keyword(s):

Eastern Europe ◽

Political Ecology ◽

Food Systems ◽

Food System ◽

Agrarian Change ◽

Alternative Food ◽

Alternative Food Networks ◽

Sustainable Livelihood ◽

Theoretical Approaches ◽

Food Networks

In response to calls by scholars to deepen theoretical engagement in research on Alternative Food Networks (AFNs), in this article we critically discuss and assess major theoretical approaches deployed in the study of AFNs. After highlighting the strengths and limitations of each theoretical approach, we provide an alternative framework – which we refer to as the Geographical Political Ecology of Food Systems – that integrates the contributions that have emerged in the study of the alternative geographies of food with an understanding of capitalist processes in the food system. We do this by bringing together literature on the political ecology of food systems and multiple spatialities, including Doreen Massey's understanding of space as a heterogeneous multiplicity and Eric Sheppard's conceptualization of sociospatial positionality. We utilize research on agrarian change and AFNs in Eastern Europe to elaborate this approach. We argue that this new perspective helps navigate tensions in AFN scholarship, and provides new avenues for research and action. We focus particularly on the ability of AFNs to provide a sustainable livelihood for participating farmers, thus far a neglected topic in AFN research in Europe.Keywords: Alternative Food Networks, Eastern Europe, spatialities, positionality, livelihoods

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Linking Food Democracy and Sustainability on the Ground: Learnings from the Study of Three Alternative Food Networks in Brussels

Politics and Governance ◽

10.17645/pag.v7i4.2023 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 7 (4) ◽

pp. 21-31 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

François Lohest ◽

Tom Bauler ◽

Solène Sureau ◽

Joris Van Mol ◽

Wouter M. J. Achten

Keyword(s):

Food System ◽

Sustainability Assessment ◽

Transformation Process ◽

Alternative Food ◽

Alternative Food Networks ◽

Participatory Action ◽

Action Research Project ◽

The People ◽

Food Networks ◽

Food Democracy

The article explores and discusses, both conceptually and empirically, the exercise of food democracy in the context of three alternative food networks (AFNs) in Brussels, Belgium. It demonstrates that food democracy can be described as a “vector of sustainability transition”. The argumentation is built on the results of a 3.5-year participatory-action research project that configured and applied a sustainability assessment framework with the three local AFNs under study. Firstly, the article presents a localized understanding of food democracy. Food democracy is defined as a process aiming to transform the current food system to a more sustainable one. This transformation process starts from a specific point: the people. Indeed, the three AFNs define and implement concrete processes of power-configuration to alter the political, economic, and social relationships between consumers and producers as well as between retailers and producers. Secondly, the article assesses and discusses how the three AFNs perform these practices of food democracy and what effects these have on the actors concerned. The assessment shows that the three AFNs distinguish themselves along a gradient of their transformative potential in terms of practices. However, this variation in their interpretation of food democracy does not translate into a gradient of performance.

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Know the Farmer That Feeds You: A Cross-Country Analysis of Spatial-Relational Proximities and the Attractiveness of Community Supported Agriculture

Agriculture ◽

10.3390/agriculture11101006 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 11 (10) ◽

pp. 1006

Author(s):

Christina Gugerell ◽

Takeshi Sato ◽

Christine Hvitsand ◽

Daichi Toriyama ◽

Nobuhiro Suzuki ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Principal Component Analysis ◽

Food System ◽

Principal Component ◽

Component Analysis ◽

Alternative Food ◽

Spatial Proximity ◽

Community Supported Agriculture ◽

Alternative Food Networks ◽

Food Networks ◽

Alternative Food Network

While food production and consumption processes worldwide are characterized by geographical and social distance, alternative food networks aim to reconnect producers and consumers. Our study proposes a framework to distinguish multiple dimensions of proximity in the context of Community Supported Agriculture (a type of alternative food network) and to quantitatively evaluate them. In a principal component analysis, we aggregated various detailed proximity items from a multinational survey using principal component analysis and examined their relationship with the attractiveness of Community Supported Agriculture in a multiple regression analysis. Our findings highlight the importance of relational proximity and thus of increasing trust, collaboration, and the sharing of values and knowledge within and across organizations in the food system. Rather than focusing on spatial proximity, increasing relational proximity might support alternative food networks, such as Community Supported Agriculture.

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Notes on the practice of food justice in the U.S.: understanding and confronting trauma and inequity

Journal of Political Ecology ◽

10.2458/v22i1.21077 ◽

2015 ◽

Vol 22 (1) ◽

pp. 27 ◽

Cited By ~ 17

Author(s):

Rachel Slocum ◽

Kirsten Valentine Cadieux

Keyword(s):

Racial Inequality ◽

Food Systems ◽

Food System ◽

Radical Change ◽

Food Justice ◽

Alternative Food ◽

Alternative Food Networks ◽

Food Networks ◽

Food Movement ◽

The U.S

The lexicon of the U.S. food movement has expanded to include the term 'food justice.' Emerging after approximately two decades of food advocacy, this term frames structural critiques of agri-food systems and calls for radical change. Over those twenty years, practitioners and scholars have argued that the food movement was in danger of creating an 'alternative' food system for the white middle class. Alternative food networks drew on white imaginaries of an idyllic communal past, promoted consumer-oriented, market-driven change, and left yawning silences in the areas of gendered work, migrant labor, and racial inequality. Justice was often beside the point. Now, among practitioners and scholars we see an enthusiastic surge in the use of the term food justice but a vagueness on the particulars. In scholarship and practice, that vagueness manifests in overly general statements about ending oppression, or morphs into outright conflation of the dominant food movement's work with food justice (see What does it mean to do food justice? Cadieux and Slocum (2015), in this Issue). In this article, we focus on one of the four nodes (trauma/inequity, exchange, land and labor) around which food justice organizing appears to occur: acknowledging and confronting historical, collective trauma and persistent race, gender, and class inequality. We apply what we have learned from our research in U.S. and Canadian agri-food systems to suggest working methods that might guide practitioners as they work toward food justice, and scholars as they seek to study it. In the interests of ensuring accountability to socially just research and action, we suggest that scholars and practitioners need to be more clear on what it means to practice food justice. Towards such clarity and accountability, we urge scholars and practitioners to collaboratively document how groups move toward food justice, what thwarts and what enables them.Key words: food justice, trauma, food movement, alternative food networks, antiracism

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Innovazione sociale e strategie di connessione delle reti alimentari alternative

SOCIOLOGIA URBANA E RURALE ◽

10.3280/sur2008-087007 ◽

2009 ◽

pp. 115-134

Author(s):

Ada Cavazzani

Keyword(s):

Latin American ◽

Food System ◽

Social Innovation ◽

Alternative Food ◽

Alternative Food Networks ◽

Asian Countries ◽

Scientific Debate ◽

The Social ◽

Food Networks ◽

Alternative Practices

- This paper is discussing the social innovation represented by the alternative food networks in Italy. With reference to the scientific debate, the analysis is foSummaries cussed on three main issues: the diversity of the networks, their common principles and the strategies of inter-connection among the different networks. These networks are based on the development of direct relationships between producers and consumers and on processes of food re-localisation. They counteract the dominant agro-food system by promoting quality products distributed through short chains. The emerging inter-connection between the various collective practices linked to the question of food production is interpreted as an alternative globalization. Initiatives promoted by peasant organizations of Latin American, African and Asian countries tend to be reinforced by the connection with the alternative practices of food producers and reflexive consumers of Western countries.Key words: social innovation; alternative food networks; peasant agriculture; short chains; critical consumers; inter-connection.

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The Coexistence of Local and Global Food Supply Chains: The Lombardy Region Case Study

Agriculture ◽

10.3390/agriculture10110540 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 10 (11) ◽

pp. 540

Author(s):

Chiara Mazzocchi ◽

Stefano Corsi ◽

Giordano Ruggeri

Keyword(s):

Supply Chains ◽

Food Supply ◽

Food System ◽

Least Square ◽

Alternative Food ◽

Alternative Food Networks ◽

Lombardy Region ◽

Food Supply Chains ◽

Food Networks ◽

Global Food

Over the last years, the trust of consumers in the quality and sustainability of the food system has weakened due to the disconnection between producers and consumers. Alternative Food Networks (AFNs) and Short Food Supply Chains (SFSCs), born out of the perceived loss of trust in the globalized food system, are trying to shorten the gap between farmers and consumers. Nowadays, many scholars agree that local and global food systems coexist, and consumers usually buy both in local and in global food chains. Our study aims to understand the factors that affect the development of AFNs with a specific focus on the interactions with small- and large-scale food retailing in the Lombardy region in the north of Italy. We employ an Ordinary Least Square (OLS) model, on a municipal scale, in which the dependent variable measures the number of participatory activities carried out by farmers and consumers in AFNs. The main results highlight that conventional large retailers and alternative food networks are linked, and that the coexistence of the two market channels may lead to the development for both of them. Contrarily, where small stores exist, they may compete with an alternative food channel, as they offer similar products and services.

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Middle Class, Tradition and the Desi-Realm—Discourses of Alternative Food Networks in Bengaluru, India

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su12072741 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 12 (7) ◽

pp. 2741

Author(s):

Mirka Erler ◽

Christoph Dittrich

Keyword(s):

Middle Class ◽

Food System ◽

Global South ◽

Traditional Agriculture ◽

Alternative Food ◽

Alternative Food Networks ◽

Expert Interviews ◽

Food Practices ◽

Food Networks ◽

The City

It has repeatedly been claimed that persistent traditional agriculture and marketing in countries of the Global South, such as India, are a fruitful basis for the foundation of alternative food networks (AFNs). However, literature on AFNs in the Global South is scarce and it thus remains uncertain how the appropriation of traditional agri-food practices plays out. We conducted semi-structured expert interviews with representatives of 14 AFNs in Bengaluru, India, in order to explore their aims and approaches. We found that there is a high variety of different AFNs in the city. One salient discourse among the representatives was that the agri-food system can be improved by a revitalization of tradition. In this paper, we discuss the implications of this conviction on representatives of AFNs. Traditionalism, we argue, does rather represent a deflection from achieving the stated goals of the AFN, namely the improvement of the livelihood of Indian farmers.

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Understanding consumer’s motivations and behaviour in alternative food networks

British Food Journal ◽

10.1108/bfj-01-2019-0032 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 121 (9) ◽

pp. 2102-2115 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

Luigi Mastronardi ◽

Luca Romagnoli ◽

Giampiero Mazzocchi ◽

Vincenzo Giaccio ◽

Davide Marino

Keyword(s):

Urban Areas ◽

Food System ◽

Total Sample ◽

Alternative Food ◽

Alternative Food Networks ◽

Multilevel Regression ◽

Content Type ◽

Demographic Profiles ◽

Food Networks ◽

Food Policies

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationships in alternative food networks (AFNs) between the purchase of food, the motivations of consumers and their socio-demographic profiles. Design/methodology/approach The study includes a total sample of 1,200 individual questionnaires, administered to the customers of 34 AFNs in different urban areas. The methodology employed is multilevel regression analysis, which is useful for dealing with data with a nested structure. Findings The results allowed us to depict some findings: the most important motivations in purchasing decisions are the perceived quality as well as comfort with the location of the markets, shopping experience, variety of offered products and delivery methods. Other interesting results relate to the presence of children in the families and the role of women in the choice of quality food. Practical implications The observations could represent a basis for thinking about how to improve consumers’ behaviour and, at the same time, try to remove the obstacles to a greater recognition of the importance of AFNs by consumers. Originality/value The paper contributes to the debate on food policies. Indeed, the integration of the results into food policies could help to intercept the consumers’ trends and promote a transition of the food system towards a path of sustainability, in which the AFNs are the organisational expression of a change that concerns a wide geography and a large number of social and economic actors.

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Alternative Food Networks (AFNs): Determinants for consumer and farmer participation in Lombardy, Italy

Agricultural Economics (Zemědělská ekonomika) ◽

10.17221/230/2018-agricecon ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 65 (No. 6) ◽

pp. 259-269 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Stefano Corsi ◽

Chiara Mazzocchi

Keyword(s):

Agricultural Sector ◽

Food System ◽

Scaling Up ◽

Ordinary Least Squares ◽

Northern Italy ◽

Alternative Food ◽

Alternative Food Networks ◽

Local Areas ◽

Food Networks ◽

Specific Factors

Scaling up supply chains in the interest of cost-effectiveness has led to an increasing disconnection between producers and consumers in today’s globalised food system. This paper assesses the agricultural and territorial drivers that influence the development of Alternative Food Networks (AFNs), where consumers and producers act together, by implementing an Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) regression. The analysis was carried out at a municipal scale in Lombardy, in northern Italy. The territorial characteristics of the local areas were less important in explaining the level of consumer and producer participation in the alternative food networks, rather than the specific factors related to the agricultural sector.

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