Tag Archives: Policy

Rural development driven by unfolding rural webs

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Today the main outcomes of the EU-funded project ETUDE were presented by our colleagues Jan Douwe van der Ploeg (scientific coordinator of ETUDE), Rudolf van Broekhuizen (project-coordinator) and Henk Oostindie (senior researcher).  Main finding is that neither policy, nor markets or grass root rural development activities are by itself decisive for successful rural development, but the web of different and increasingly interlinked networks. Or as Jan Douwe van der Ploeg states:

Successful rural development is rooted in a myriad of encounters, transactions, interactions and networks that link people, resources, activities and markets. (Source: E-magazine by British Publisher, pp. 64-65). 

Van der Ploeg & Marsden (in ‘Some Final Reflections’, the concluding chapter in the book ‘Unfolding webs’ , p 227) refer to these rural web as emerging counter-structures: 

because rural development processes (that are grounded upon and resulting from this web) are essentially transitional: they represent a major shift that takes many years to occur and which proceeds through changing conditions of invisibility and confusion. Visibility, coherence and comprehension only occur during, and as an effect of, this transition. We also refer to the rural web as a counter-structure because it increasingly helps to deal with complexity (especially Chapter 8 of this Volume), creating simultaneously new patterns of coherence. All this relates to the contested nature of rural development: what might be highly meaningful in terms of the rural web, might be insignificant or even ludicrous at the level of the dominant structure. What we are beginning to conceptually explain here, therefore, are the particular dynamic qualities (both new coherences and contestations) of web formation. These are, indeed, built out of the seeming contradiction between creating counter-structures to prevailing conditions, at the same time as re-creating new coherences out of these very deviations and ruptures.

The project has come to a closure. The findings and recommendations will soon be published in a second book. Earlier publications, such as the chapters of the first book ‘Unfolding webs’, edited by Jan Douwe van der Ploeg & Terry Marsden and published by Royal Van Gorcum, and deliverables (e.g. case study reports) can be downloaded at the ETUDE-website.

For more information on the outcomes you can contact one of the colleagues.

Evolution of Rural Development Paradigm in Brazil

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In a recent research seminar prof. Sergio Schneider (schneide@ufrgs.br), coordinator of the  Rural Development Post Graduate Program from the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (Brazil), presented a telling analysis of major changes in Rural Developments Policies in Brazil in the last twenty years. He explained that the recent evolution in rural development policies, as effectuated by president Lula, has to be understood within the context the evident political struggles on land. Brazil is a large country with traditionally a sharp contrast between the interests of agro-industrial conglomerates and social rural movements of landless people and peasants (e.g. MST).

This is reflected in a dualist agrarian structure between capitalist and entrepreneurial family farming and peasant familiy farming and rural poor (landless) who are struggling for survival and autonomy. In 1995 1 % of the owners with more then 1000 ha owned 45% of all land, while 90% of the owners with less then 100 ha owned only 20%. An unexpected and striking consequence of rural poverty is, that food security in rural areas is significantly lower then in urban areas. In rural areas 26% of the housholds suffers severe food insecurity versus 17% in urban areas. Because of this dualist agrarian structure Brazil is probably the only country in the world with two Ministries of Agriculture, serving different needs.

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Rural Development in Brazil: interfaces between public policy and social actors

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From the 10th till the 28th of February Prof. Sergio Schneider of the Federal University of Rio Grande de Sul (UFRGS) in Brazil is visiting Wageningen under the agreement CAPES-Wageningen University. Sergio is Professor of Rural Sociology and Coordinator of the Post-Graduate Programme in Rural Development (PGDR). In his contribution to the Rural Sociology Weblog he briefly introduces his research domain. He will also present this at a research seminar of the Rural Sociology Group on Thursday 19 February at 16.00 hrs in room C70 of the Leeuwenborch building.

Sergio SchneiderBy Sergio Schneider – Since the 1990’s discussions on rural development in Brazil are no longer associated with policies to combat poverty. From these times onwards discussions on rural development have been related to themes like environmental sustainability, land reform, policies to support small family farming and more recently, the issue of food security. The discussion on rural development in Brazil has gained strong momentum … Continue reading →

Rethinking US food policy

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I have been out of office a lot the last weeks and in this era of e-communication this automatically means a full e-mail box. Yesterday and today I’ve made an effort to read, answer and either save or delete most of them. Among the many mails, was one that contained a link to an article written by Michael Pollan, entitled ‘Farmer in Chief’, in which he addresses the president-elect (the article was written before the elections) by saying “It may surprise you to learn that among the issues that will occupy much of your time in the coming years is one you barely mentioned during the campaign: food.”  In a very interesting article Pollan, well-known for his well-written and thought-provoking books ‘The omnivore’s dilemma’ and ‘In defence of food’, outlines his agenda for food policy reforms. What I particularly like and admire in his essay is his comprehensive approach to food, i.e. he convincingly demonstrates that food is related to a multitude of problems that contemporary society is facing: health problems (obesity and maltnutrition), environmental pollution, social and economic inequalities, etc… According to Pollan, the many food-related problems of contemporary society are on the one hand due to the reliance of the food system on fossil fuels and on the other hand due to an eating culture based on fast, cheap and easy food . The policy agenda he proposes to overcome the many problems and its causes are threefold: 1) to resolarize the farm, 2) to reregionalize the food system and 3) to rebuild eating culture. For those interested in Pollan’s vision, a 90 minute interview with him can be found on the website of the Dutch documentary programme Tegenlicht (Backlight).