Emmelien Venselaar reflects on attending the Committee on World Food Security
Last month I taught a course on global food security governance. As part of the course students were able to travel to Rome to observe the Committee on World Food...
New Books on Food Security
Routledge has made up a nice list of their books that address issues related to food security. The great news is that there is a 20% discount available. Here is the...
Political Ecologies of Conflict, Capitalism and Contestation
International Conference: Political Ecologies of Conflict, Capitalism and Contestation (PE-3C) When: 7-9 July 2016 Where: Hotel Wageningse Berg, Wageningen, The Netherlands Organised by: Wageningen University and School of Oriental and African Studies SOAS), University...
Call for Paper Abstracts – Sustainable and Just Rural Transitions: Connections and Complexities
XIV World Congress of Rural Sociology August 10-14, 2016, Toronto, Canada Call for Paper Abstracts: Open May 19 – November 1, 2015 Sustainable and Just Rural Transitions: Connections and Complexities Global environmental changes, shifting resource...
Mapping the State of Play on the Global Food Landscape
The Special issue of Canadian Food Studies on Mapping the State of Play on the Global Food Landscape is now online and freely available here: http://canadianfoodstudies.uwaterloo.ca/index.php/cfs/index I have published a piece about the need for...
Essay competition to express innovative solutions and ideas on extensive livestock!
Take this unique opportunity to contribute to the international expo and conference ‘Herding for the Markets’ and write an essay about your ideas on extensive livestock. Winners will have the opportunity to present their ideas...
International Masters in Rural Development: Field Visit to Soc Trang Province, Vietnam
As I explained last week, I am representing the Rural Sociology Group in a case study summer programme organized by Can Tho University's Mekong Delta Development Research Institute. [caption id="attachment_1734" align="alignleft" width="300"]
Meeting with district representatives of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development[/caption]
On Friday, August 7th, the Case Study group visited two areas in the Soc Trang province of Vietnam. The first stop was a visit to a district office of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. Here, students and staff were able to ask officials questions related to their selected research topics and interests. One policy initiative we learnt about was a plan to increase the number of dairy cows in rural areas as a poverty reduction strategy. This programme stems from the national Agricultural Restructuring Plan where key crops and animals were identified, dairy cows being one of them.
[caption id="attachment_1735" align="alignright" width="300"]
Pigs for bio gas and food[/caption]
From there we moved to My Xuyen district where food production is centred on upland crops. We visited two farms here. The first had cows and pigs and were producing bio gas. In this family, the husband undertook farm labour and the wife worked a government job.
Mekon Delta Case Study: Agricultural transformation in developing countries under contexts of urbanization and climate change
Here is what I am getting up to this month!...
Thought of the day
Peck and Tickell observe that under the "asymmetrical scale politics of neoliberalism, local institutions and actors [are] being given responsibility without power, while international institutions and actors [are] gaining power without...