10 May

Everyone is affected by the decisions that shape our food systems. However, in global food security governance spaces, there is the idea of a “most-affected principle.” This is meant to prioritize...

13 Jul

On 20 May 2020 the European Commission (EC) released its new Farm to Fork (F2F) Strategy for a fair, healthy, and environmentally-friendly food system. In this webinar, we discuss the...

bok cover Voltaire once said that “no problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking”. In this book, we put that statement to the test. The problems plaguing food systems are well researched and well known. But how can we support transformation towards sustainable and just food systems? One thing is clear,  the objective of future food systems can no longer be to simply maximise productivity     We are very pleased to announce that our new book, Sustainable Food Futures: Multidisciplinary Solutions, has just been published. The book includes proposals for solutions to move us toward more sustainable food futures.  The solutions, which are based on concrete cases, are organised around 4 themes:
  1. Recognizing place
  2. Enhancing participation
  3. Challenging markets
  4. Designing sustainable food futures
  The solutions proposed in this book can be read as an atlas of possibilities. There are multiple roads we can, and must, travel to bring us towards our destination: just and sustainable food futures. And yet, instead of moving towards a brighter future, we continue with a status quo that is not good enough. To reach sustainable food futures, we require diligent and creative route planning. Not every route will work for everyone, or every context. Some routes will require us to go off road, while others take us along the toll roads. Others set about redefining what we know to be a road, and some may lead us directly to road blocks. It is our hope that the majority will lead us to new social-technical or social-economic arrangements that promote just, sustainable, and fair food futures. The book is available as a hardback, paperback and eBook.  We would really appreciate it if you could ask your local libraries to purchase a copy!  PS- it includes recipes!

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This was originally posted on ILEIA's website. It was written by  Stephen Sherwood, Myriam Paredes and Alberto Arce who have edited a new book ‘Agriculture, Food, and Social Change: The Everyday Vitality of Latin America’ (UK: Routledge/Earthscan Press). I have co-authored a chapter in this book that I will summarise in a later post.
A great deal of energy has been invested in attempts to influence the thinking in science and government on the problems of industrial food and the benefits of agroecology and food sovereignty. Meanwhile, people everywhere take responsibility for creating the changes they want to see through daily food practices in their families, neighbourhoods and social networks. In addition to organising for ‘resistance’, we call for greater attention to the latent potential in daily living and being, or existence.
A popular ‘trueque’ or barter trade event in northern Ecuador, where people exchange their goods without the use of money. Photo: Colectivo Agroecólogio
We all have a serious problem when people’s most basic activity – eating – undermines their ability to exist. Yet this is precisely what we have achieved with the advent of modern food. Through the pursuit of cheap food as a ‘good’, we have generated a series of unwanted ‘bads’, such as mass destruction of soils and water systems, erosion of agrobiodiversity, and widescale sickness and death by pesticides, not to mention the constitution of two, rampant pandemics: overweight/obesity and global warming/climate change. Fortunately, growing awareness of the contradictions of modern food is sparking lively counter movements. We challenge the widespread preoccupation over how agriculture, food, and development should be. Instead, we focus on how everyday experience in agriculture and food is. The work of social movements in the Americas leads us to call attention to the forces of change in people’s everyday encounters with food – not as characterised in concept, but rather as embodied in practice.

In October over 500 people from across  Europe gathered in Romania for five days to multiply food sovereignty platforms across the continent. The Dutch Delegation was followed by a professional filmmaker...

By Jordan Treakle
This entry is part of a special series of blog posts about the UN’s Committee on World Food Security (CFS): The Future of the CFS? Collectively reflecting on the directions of UN’s most inclusive body. Read more about this project here. This is not an exclusive project. If you would like to participate, please let us know: foodsecuresolutions@gmail.com This week we take a diversion and focus on the outcomes of the International Seminar on Local Public Policies for Food Sovereignty that took place in mid-November in the Basque Country.  In this post Jordan Treakle identifies key themes to emerge out of the Seminar. We note that these themes relate to discussions taking place at the CFS and are thus relevant for this special series. Further, while focussing on global policies, there is a need to also address local-level policies.
treakle_donostia2 In mid-November over a hundred participants from across Europe, the Americas, and Asia convened at the International Seminar on Local Public Policies for Food Sovereignty in Donostia (San Sebastian), Spain to share experiences and perspectives on four inter-related topics linked to food sovereignty:
  • Land access and the commons
  • The role of education in public food policies
  • Linking urban and rural spaces through territorial development approaches
  • Local public policies to support agroecology
Donostia is known as a food capital of the country with its famous tapas culture, as well as having a fiercely independent regional political identity. In this delicious and inspiring socio-political environment one of the core issues of the Seminar was the recognition that “urban” food policies (such as the Milan Urban Food Policy Pact) and agendas (such as the role of urban policies in the Sustainable Development Goals) are gaining prominence in the international policy arena. And to illustrate this trend, much of the Seminar focused on presenting urban-centered food sovereignty initiatives in Spain, such as the work of Red TERRAE on supporting municipal agroecology platforms and Llaurant Barcelona on mapping and reorienting Barcelona’s tourist food economy toward food sovereignty. As pointed out by representatives of the NGO FIAN, the international policy turn to “urban” spaces is not only a response to an increasingly urbanized world, but also reflects certain urban-focused political agendas, and thus presents both opportunities and challenges for more holistic systems-based approaches to supporting social justice and environmental sustainability in agriculture and food systems. Drawing on the event’s presentations and participants’ discussions, below are some topics for thought and debate: