Author Archives: RSO-Students

Romashki or a Life Less Ordinary, part 3

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By Thomas Macintyre

…Belka the squirrel had been swishing her tail back and forth, and when I looked at her she held out a walnut for me to take. “This is a present” she said, as I took the nut. “It is a nut that was too high for you to reach in the tree. We must all help each other you know – humans and animals and all other life on earth.”  Having thanked Belka I waved a last farewell to my friends and began the walk back through the reeds. Just as I was about to begin the walk up the hill I heard a loud croak from Irenushka the frog and then the words of the Water Fairy being sung across the reeds: “Tom, we also have a gift for you. Keep walking, you will feel it soon.” I heard soft chanting words blowing in the breeze: “Earth fire wind and hail; open the realm of the fairytale.”

Soon after, as I reached the road that would take me to that other world, I heard a roaring thunder and saw the heavens open up as a torrential rain began to pour. Soaked in seconds I trudged along, my socks squelching in unison with the klomp, klomp of my wooden shoes on the road. For a second I felt a twinge of annoyance at being wet and cold, but then I stopped on the road and felt a sense of goodness swell up inside of me. Looking up at the sky as rain drops pounded my face I thought to myself: ‘the blessed water in a fairytale – the parting gift from Romashki.’ (Excerpt from page 153). Continue reading →

Intensive Program Slovakia

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By Marlies Meijer, MSc student

When I first heard about the Intensive Programme in Slovakia, I did not really know what to expect. The core of my MSc lies at land use planning, but for my thesis I choose a combination with rural sociology. What triggered me the most was the country. I’ve never been to Eastern (or Central) Europe and saw in the IP a great opportunity to experience transition from communism to capitalism and into EU-membership recently. On the first day the exchange with other students (about 40 from 12 universities, and even more countries) turned out to be just as interesting. Encouraged by cheap beer we had long discussions about everything, but still, mostly about the role of agriculture in the different countries.

For me the three day excursion to different villages in the Nitra-region was definitely a highlight. We were divided into small groups, each with a different region. My group stayed in a small cottage, north of Nitra. We were introduced to mayors of the small villages. I liked to see the differences between the Dutch planning system, where everything is arranged from paving stone to strategic master plans for 2030; and the project-based development in the little Slovakian villages: “if we have the money, we’ll think about constructing a sewerage system next year”. It makes all problems we have on the Dutch countryside (like “verrommeling”) relatively small.

The second day we went to a large cooperative farm. The size was overwhelming: 3000 ha., 120 employees, 800 cows and immense fields of rapeseed. But this was not everything; the cooperative farm (a legacy from communist times) had supporting departments in almost all layers of the market. We visited a bakery, a tool shop and a local grocery store (“Our Home”), all embodied in the cooperative. It put quite a different perspective on the development of short-supply-linkages. Small farms struggle in Slovakia, and we did not see many small scale (innovative) initiatives. What surprised me the most was that agriculture seemed to be disintegrated from all kinds of regional developments. There were no relations between local administration and the agricultural sector, and agriculture was not seen as a positive contribution (or even part of) to the landscape. Moreover the EU LEADER programme focussed in this region on social and economic developments; agriculture was not mentioned in the main objectives. Not surprisingly, since many villages suffer from more urgent problems, like ageing, unemployment, depopulation and a lack of basic social services.

But still, it pointed out that rural development cannot be just about agriculture, it is about the development of rural region entirely as well. Apart from farmers there are so many local actors that also could and should be included. For me it also pointed out that land use planning and rural development are not so different in essence. While approaches could be different, in the end it is about the same: sustainable development of (rural) regions.

Many new experiences in direct marketing, part 4

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By Corinna Feldmann – MSc Student

Food boxes

I already spent one month at the farm in Nettelkamp (Lüneburger Heide) – it is quite amazing here. Each day a lot of food boxes are filled with good organic products and delivered to couples, families and companies. I like the idea of supplying about 1300 customers per week with healthy and fresh foodstuff. But it also means a lot of organisation and coordination. We are always very busy with harvesting herbs and vegetables (it is time for asparagus right now), pre-packing, and the ordering of the right amount of products. Many people work in the office and deal with the requests and complaints of the customers. Although we put a lot of effort into the packing of the food boxes, some customers do not exactly receive what they ordered.

Last week I carried out a survey among all the customers to find out more about the reasons why they order an organic food box. Almost all of them sent back the questionnaires. Now I have got a lot to do with the evaluation of this survey. It is also going to be part of my final report.

Since Monday we got support from two trainees – one is from Uzbekistan and the other one from Russia. They help us with the field work and practise the German language.

Every once in a while there are cultural events in the farm barn. This weekend a choir and a group of drum players are performing in the evening. Thus, I made a lot of cake today and prepared dough for pizza. As you can see, it is not getting boring here, although it is quite a small village in a very rural area.

Repeasantisation in Araponga, Brazil – a quest for space

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By Leonardo Ayabe van den Berg, MSc graduate International Development Studies

Recently I completed my MSc-thesis. The thesis research is set in the municipality of Araponga in Brazil, where (re)peasantisation occurred and continues to occur. Here I describe some of the findings of my research.  When interested you can downlaod a pdf of my thesis ‘Invisible peasant movements: A case study of (re)peasantisation in Brazil‘.

Araponga

Araponga

When I started to read about the peasantry there were two major things that occurred to me as striking. First, in policy peasants are often considered as a group of laggards: who are unable to take care of themselves and therefore need social assistance; who rely on primitive forms of technology and therefore must be modernized; or who are impeded by a stagnant, traditional mentality and must therefore be converted into small entrepreneurs. The peasant mode of farming is seldomly considered in its own right. Second, in academic theory peasants are predicted to disappear, weaken or live a life of poverty as a result of their inferior mode of production and their helplessness. Departing from the assumption that actors are driven by a specific economic-rational logic, neo-liberal approaches roughly theorise that peasants commoditize, compete with other farms as a result of which there will be regional growth. Tradition or culture can block economic rationality and the transition from peasant to entrepreneur. The peasant will then be doomed to poverty. In contrast to the neo-liberal approach, neo-Marxist approaches, most of which also assume that the peasant is driven by an economic logic and commoditize, theorise that commoditization will either lead to the destruction of the peasant enterprise or to a fate of poverty. This is the result of price fluctuations, squeeze in agriculture (caused by the trend of decreasing produce prices and increasing input prices for farmers), or newly emerging food networks (through which income from weaker, peasant, parts of the chain are squeezed in favour of the more powerful, retailers, part of the chain). These predictions and preconceptions contradict with what happened in Araponga, a rural municipality in the state of Minas Gerais in Brazil where there was a rise in the number of peasants and an increase in welfare. The objective of this thesis was to find out how this was possible: how had (re)peasantisation occurred in Araponga. Continue reading →

A new place for my internship: Delivery of organic food boxes, part 3

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By Corinna Feldmann – MSc Student

After two months of practical work at the sheep farm and dairy, I decided to leave that place. Working conditions as well as social interaction and communication on the farm became worse and worse; the assignment of tasks and responsibilities was very unclear and often resulted in misunderstandings. Working at the farm was very dissatisfying in the end.

Instead, last week I started working at a farm close to the ‘Lüneburger Heide’ in Northern Germany. This farm is also very engaged in direct marketing. They deliver organic food boxes to 1300 customers in the region. The farm produces a lot of vegetables, herbs, and fruits, as well as some beef and pork meat. The food boxes are supplemented by many organic products from other organic farms and a wholesaler. Consumers can get almost everything they like in their individual food box. For more information you can have a look at the homepage: www.elbers-hof.de.