Advies voor energiecoöperaties

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Esther Veen's avataronderzoekerstadslandbouw

Bijna alle MSc studenten van Wageningen Universiteit volgen het vak Academic Consultancy Training. Hierin vervullen ze als groep een consultancy opdracht voor een ‘echte’ opdrachtgever. Ze worden bijgestaan door een inhoudelijk expert en een coach op het proces. Ongeveer een jaar geleden heb ik voor het eerst zo’n groepje studenten gecoacht. Een leerzame en erg leuke ervaring. Ik heb nu voor een tweede keer een groepje mogen begeleiden. ‘Mijn’ groepje deed een opdracht voor SamenGroen. SamenGroen levert zonnepanelen en ondersteunt energiecoöperaties. De groep beantwoordde de volgende vraag:

‘Hoe kan SamenGroen haar tijd en middelen efficiënt inzetten voor het adviseren en begeleiden van energiecoöperaties?’

Het komen tot een goed adviesrapport is een heel proces. Eerst moeten de studenten de precieze vraag van de opdrachtgever definiëren, wat nog best een opgave was. Wat wil hij precies weten, wat is het doel achter zijn vraag, en wat is mogelijk binnen…

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Food Otherwise conference – a video impression

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As posted before the Food Otherwise conference has been very succesfull. A bi-lingual (Dutch/English) video impression is now available:

FoodNET – where EU food projects meet

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As Rural Sociology Group we have particiapted in several food related EU-funded research projects for all of which a website or weblog was created. Most recent food projects Rural Sociology has participated in are PUREFOOD, Foodlinks, GLAMUR & SUPURBFOOD. TRANSMANGO has just started and a website will soon be launched.

To better integrate and disseminate the findings research projects and to facilitate discussion and interaction among among all those involved and interested FoodNET has been launced: http://foodnet.ning.com. FoodNET replaces the Sustainable Food weblog.

FoodNET is as a platform that will keep you posted on latest research on sustainable food provisioning and farming. FoodNET is a website and blog in one. The FoodNet Team is on Twitter as well: @foodnet_eu. Latest Tweet is shown at the right of this weblog, below our Rural Sociology WU tweets. We will also have the FoodNET tweets published at our Rural Sociology Group Facebook page.

Food Tank: Five Ways to Change the Food System

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About the Food Tank:

Our food system is broken. Some people don’t have enough food, while others are eating too much. There’s only one way to fix this problem—and it starts with you and me.

Food Tank: The Food Think Tank is for the 7 billion people who have to eat every day. We will offer solutions and environmentally sustainable ways of alleviating hunger, obesity, and poverty by creating a network of connections and information for all of us to consume and share. Food Tank is for farmers and producers, policy makers and government leaders, researchers and scientists, academics and journalists, and the funding and donor communities to collaborate on providing sustainable solutions for our most pressing environmental and social problems.

As much as we need new thinking on global food system issues, we also need new doing. Around the world, people and organizations have developed innovative, on-the-ground solutions to the most pressing issues in food and agriculture. Through years of field visits (and years of trying to eat better in her own community) our President Danielle Nierenberg has helped to highlight and promote these best practices. Today, we hope to bridge the domestic and global food issues by highlighting how hunger, obesity, climate change, unemployment, and other problems can be solved by more research and investment in sustainable agriculture.

Food Tank will highlight hope and success in agriculture. We will feature innovative ideas that are already working on the ground, in cities, in kitchens, in fields and in laboratories. These innovations need more attention, more research, and ultimately more funding to be replicated and scaled-up. And that is where we need you. We all need to work together to find solutions that nourish ourselves and protect the planet.

See the clip how the food systems can be changed in the five ways:

MSc Thesis on return-migration in Turkey-Kurdistan

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The destruction and burning of thousands of rural settlements and the forced migration of hundred thousands, if not millions of (mostly) Kurdish villagers is one of the most painful and pressing issues in Turkey. Though the evacuations date back to the end of the 1980s, the issue has left a heavy legacy, socially, politically, and economically.

Over the last years, many thousands of people returned to their villages. Yet little is known about who returns and when and how livelihoods are rebuild . The evidence there is suggests that not all segments of the population return in equal proportions and that young men and young families in particular are underrepresented among the returnees. Furthermore, it transpires that people do not exchange their urban accommodation for a rural one; instead, it appears that what may be identified as dual or extended settlement patterns emerge. Apparently, there is not only no coming back to an earlier condition, but rather the development of new ways of organizing living and working space.

For those attempting return, there are new problems, livelihood difficulties that they did not have to face prior to their evacuation. Clearly, re-establishment as a peasant is difficult because most of the displaced have to start from scratch: they arrive back to find their fields and houses ruined. Furthermore, community facilities and services like health care and education facilities and water and electricity supplies were similarly destroyed or fell into disrepair or just remained unsupplied. Neo-liberal policies are said to have negatively impacted returnees by undermining their ability to make a living from agriculture.

At the Rural Sociology group and in collaboration with partners in Turkey we would like to look at return migration from several perspectives. Therefore, we are looking for (two or three) students who are interested in doing a MSc thesis, looking at the (gendered) demography of return, the rebuilding of livelihood and multi-place settlement patterns and spatial mobility.

Does one of these issues make you curious and/or do you have an interest in one or more of the research themes mentioned above, please contact Joost Jongerden at joost.jongerden@wur.nl