Category Archives: Rural Development

Who’s ‘the’ farmer?

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Yesterday (Tuesday) 42 first year students , Paul Hebinck and I visited two Dutch farms for the course ‘Agricultural and Rural Development: Sociological Perspectives’ (RSO 20806 ).

We firstly visited the multifunctional farm ‘Eemlandhoeve’ of Jan Huigen. In an inspiring talk, Jan explained about the development of the Eemlandhoeve and the future plans. The farm has different functions, such as care farming, recreation, herb production, beef production and education for schoolchildren. After a nice walk around the farm and the calming farm yard (see picture), we walked to the neighbouring farm. 

The neighbouring farm ‘Hoeve ‘t Witte Schaap’ follows another path of development: a large scale dairy farm, with about 300 dairy cows and four milking robots. For most students, it was the first time they visited such a large dairy farm. The shed is large and high, with a lot of light and fresh air. Gerrit (the farmer) talked engaged about his farm, including the technology and animals. Two workers take care of the cows and by feeding them and looking after their health. The cows are fed with grass and maize of the farm and hardly received any concentrates (only in the milking robot). The farmer applies all the manure on his land. In fact, his way of farming is not that far from organic regulations.

After both visits we gathered, where Drees of ‘Willem & Drees’ gave an inspiring talk about regional production and sale of fruit and vegetables in five regions the Netherlands.

During the discussion, the students raised interesting questions. Firstly, one of the students asked Jan Huigen ‘How much of your income comes from food production?’ This – of course – was a limited amount and several students seemed concluded that he was not ‘a real farmer’, but more an entrepreneur in the countryside. Thereafter, the large scale farmer was asked how often he was actually among his animals, which was limited, since he had two workers to take care of the animals. The students seemed to conclude that he was neither ‘a real farmer’, because he had limited animal contact. Instead, he was more a ‘manager’.

To conclude, it was an inspiring excursion, which showed two very different development paths of contemporary farming in the Netherlands and gave students a great opportunity to think about the question what a farmer is nowadays.

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 →

AspergeGilde Peel en Maas

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Het AspergeGilde Peel en Maas is een samenwerking van 25 aspergetelers uit de gemeente Peel en Maas. De telersgroep werkt samen met een aantal lokale restaurants, kookstudio’s en recreatieondernemers, ook wel de vrienden van het AspergeGilde genoemd. Het AspergeGilde heeft de volgende doelstellingen:

  • promotie van de Peel en Maasregio als aspergeregio
  • bevordering van de aspergeconsumptie door nadere kennismaking met deze groente en de productiewijze ervan

Met doet dit onder andere door het organiseren van aspergearrangementen (bezoek aan een aspergeteler in combinatie met een aspergemaaltijd in een lokaal restaurant), fietstochten door het gebied, kookworkshops, etc… Elk jaar wordt het aspergeseizoen geopend door middel van een aspergemaaltijd voor een grote groep genodigden. Dit jaar vond de seizoensopening plaats op 28 maart.

Voor meer informatie over het AspergeGilde Peel en Maas verwijs ik naar het onderstaande promotiefilmpje.

Vitaal Oldambt – film over bijdrage ondernemende vrouwen aan vitaal platteland

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Wiebke Wellbrock berichtte al over netwerken van ondernemende vrouwen in Groningen, die door de Vereniging Groninger Dorpen worden ondersteund met een bijdrage vanuit een LEADER-gelden (Mit mekander), en in het bijzonder over het netwerk Wichterwest in het Westerkwartier en bijeenkomst van 8 december 2009.  Harry van Schokkenbroek heeft een mooie film gemaakt over ondernemende vrouwen in Oldambt en hun bijdrage aan een vitaal platteland. De film is te bekijken op de website www.h-schokkenbroek.nl/Film.html (in de map films 2009/2009).

Kennis arrangeren voor gebiedsontwikkeling II – verslag vanuit de gebieden

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In een eerdere post is al bericht over een verkenning van regionale kennisarrangementen. Van de bevindingen is verslag gedaan in het LEI-rapport “De werkvloer van een Kennisnetwerk Vitaal Platteland; kennis maken met regionale kennisarrangementen’. Het eindigt met aanbevelingen hoe het samen leren doen in en tussen gebieden kan worden bevorderd en ondersteund vanuit beleid en kennisinstellingen met kennisarrangementen. 

In opdracht van LNV is inmiddels voor vijftien gebieden een overzicht gemaakt van ambities, afspraken en behoefte aan ondersteuning bij het inzetten van onderwijs, onderzoek en advies voor gebiedsontwikkeling. De uitkomsten zijn op 6 oktober 2009 met de vijftien gebieden besproken. Van de inventarisatie en de uitwisseling tussen de betrokken gebieden wordt verslag gedaan in ‘Regionale kennisarrangementen; verslag quick scan en kennisdag.

De bedoeling is dat deze vijftien gebieden het voortouw nemen bij het opzetten van kennisarrangementen die het leren doen in en tussen gebieden moeten bevorderen. Ze kunnen daarbij rekenen op ondersteuning van o.a. Netwerk Platteland, Wageningen UR en de Groene Kennis Coöperatie (m.n. Programma Regionale Transitie).