Tag Archives: Food

New course: Sociology of Food Provisioning and Place-based Development

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The MSc course “Understanding Rural Development: Theories, Practices and Methodologies” (course code RSO-31806) has been revised and renamed into “Sociology of Food Provisioning and Place-based Development”. The course is mandatory for Master students within the track Sociology of Rural Development of the Master International Development Studies, specializing in rural sociology and a free choice course for Master students of other programmes and tracks. If you are interested in topics such as alternative food geographies, food citizenship, food democracy, urban food provisioning, sustainable place shaping, and regional branding, it may be worth participating in this course. Students who do not have a BSc degree in International Development Studies or related field of expertise may not have the assumed prerequisite knowledge to successfully participate and are therefore requested to contact the course coordinator, Han Wiskerke (han.wiskerke@wur.nl), to see if and how this gap can be addressed.

For more information about the contents, schedule, learning outcomes and educational activities, please click on this link or contact the course coordinator for more information or the latest version of the course guide.

Food nostalgia

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Can you see beyond a paradigm when you are inside it – immersed, educated, experienced? I wondered this watching yet another episode in the ‘intensify or die’ debate that erupted from the opening of the academic year. The episode can be seen here where Louise Fresco argues for nuance and warns against romantic food nostalgia, such as cows in pasture. Continue reading →

Feeding the world sustainable – agroecology v industrial agriculture

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Feeding the world in a sustainable way is vehemently debated these days. In international fora the debate is not just about how to increase food production to feed the world’s growing population but also whether increasing food production is adressing the key issue of the relation between poverty and hunger. Increasing food production is not a neutral matter. Although some voices like to put it that way to sustain their claim that ‘facts’ show that their solution is the only right one. A solution is never neutral just because of the combination of technological and institutional means and the social and environmental impact it has. This is not new at all all. The impact of the (first) Green Revolution has been heavely disputed and this socalled neutralness of technology has been key issue in the massive techology and innovation studies of last decades. One cannot simply ignore the wider impact of technological fixes in the debate about how to provide the world’s population in a sustainable way.

In an editorial Eric Holt-Gimenez,  Executive Director of Food First / Institute for Food and Development Policy (www.foodfirst.org) in response to a recent study in Nature has added a contribution to this ongoing debate. He argues that there is a difference between between producing more food and ending hunger.  Read his editorial at on what kind of agriculture can best solve the problem of the growing number of hungry people: agroecology or conventional industrial agriculture at http://www.agriculturesnetwork.org/magazines/global/farmer-organisations/opinion-eric-holt-gimenez or at Nourshing the planet (the weblog of the Worldwatch Institute). One can also see video of a lecture on Food movements, agroecology, and the future of food and farming.

The Christensen Fund made an interesting infographics evaluating the major differences between agroecology and industrial agriculture:

Beyond Divides: An International Winter School and Forum on Contemporary Agri-food Issues

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The Marie Curie Initial Training Network PUREFOOD project team will host a winter school and forum in Barcelona from 12-22 November 2012. The forum will be a highly collaborative and interdisciplinary event, with the joint participation of the PUREFOOD research fellows and supervisory team, a diverse group of external Ph.D. students, and respected local and international scholars and practitioners. The forum will create an atmosphere of debate, exchange, and collaboration.  The academic program will feature three distinct learning modes – expert-led discussions, peer-led paper review, and thematically integrated site visits – and will include modules oriented to some of the most prominent themes in agri-food system scholarship today.

Key themes are:

  • Food security, rights and sovereignty;
  • Social imperatives, ethics and justice;
  • Food and alterity;
  • Food policy and governance;
  • State, market and society;
  • Innovation;
  • Tradition.

Speakers at the Winter school are:

  • Dr. Patricia Allen, Director of the Center for Agroecology and Sustainable Food Systems, University of California, Santa Cruz, United States
  • Dr. Jesús Contreras Hernández, Professor of Social Anthropology, Director of the Food and Foodways Observatory, Universitat de Barcelona, Spain
  • Dr. Mike Goodman, Senior Lecturer, Department of Geography, King’s College London, United Kingdom
  • Dr. James Kirwan, Reader in Food Studies and Society, Countryside and Community Research Institute, University of Gloucestershire, United Kingdom
  • Dr. F. Xavier Medina, Director, Department Food Systems, Culture & Society at Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, Academic Director at Universitat Oberta de Catalunya

For more information about the Winter School click on  Beyond Divides – Program and Application Form. If you want to participate, please complete the application form and send it to Jessica Spayde (spaydejj@cardiff.ac.uk) by 3 October 2012.

New book – Sustainable Food Planning: Evolving Theory and Practice

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Half the world’s population is now urbanised and cities are assuming a larger role in debates about the security and sustainability of the global food system. Hence, planning for sustainable food production and consumption is becoming an increasingly important issue for planners, policymakers, designers, farmers, suppliers, activists, business and scientists alike. The rapid growth of the food planning movement owes much to the unique multi-functional character of food systems. In the wider contexts of global climate change, resource depletion, a burgeoning world population, competing food production systems and diet-related public health concerns, new paradigms for urban and regional planning capable of supporting sustainable and equitable food systems are urgently needed. This book addresses this urgent need. By working at a range of scales and with a variety of practical and theoretical models, this book reviews and elaborates definitions of sustainable food systems, and begins to define ways of achieving them. Four different themes have been defined as entry-points into the discussion of ‘sustainable food planning’. These are (1) urban food governance, (2) integrating health, environment and society, (3) urban agriculture (4) planning and design. Continue reading →