For food space: theorizing alternative food networks beyond alterity

Abstract

In response to calls by scholars to deepen theoretical engagement in research on Alternative Food Networks (AFNs), in this article we critically discuss and assess major theoretical approaches deployed in the study of AFNs. After highlighting the strengths and limitations of each theoretical approach, we provide an alternative framework – which we refer to as the Geographical Political Ecology of Food Systems – that integrates the contributions that have emerged in the study of the alternative geographies of food with an understanding of capitalist processes in the food system. We do this by bringing together literature on the political ecology of food systems and multiple spatialities, including Doreen Massey's understanding of space as a heterogeneous multiplicity and Eric Sheppard's conceptualization of sociospatial positionality. We utilize research on agrarian change and AFNs in Eastern Europe to elaborate this approach. We argue that this new perspective helps navigate tensions in AFN scholarship, and provides new avenues for research and action. We focus particularly on the ability of AFNs to provide a sustainable livelihood for participating farmers, thus far a neglected topic in AFN research in Europe.Keywords: Alternative Food Networks, Eastern Europe, spatialities, positionality, livelihoods

Virtual Barriers: Unpacking the Sustainability Implications of Online Food Spaces and the Yellowknife Farmers Market’s Response to COVID-19

“…A sustainable food system in the Canadian North requires a transformation to a self-reliant and just system that supports health through equitable and secure access to nourishing foods (1)(2)(3)(4)(5). Long before COVID-19 limited travel and gatherings, the Northwest Territories (NWT) has been impacted by high levels of food insecurity due to complex issues of remoteness, development and governance (6).…”

“…As the COVID-19 pandemic exposes gaps in the current global food system, Canada released a joint statement alongside other nations stating that food security depends on local resilience and supporting small-scale farmers, harvesters, and processers with planting, harvesting, and the fair and safe sale of products (9). Farmers' markets have been ambitiously situated as a means to support a sustainable local food system and a mechanism to promote prosperity (4,5,7,13,15,16).…”

Virtual Barriers: Unpacking the Sustainability Implications of Online Food Spaces and the Yellowknife Farmers Market’s Response to COVID-19

“…As the COVID-19 pandemic exposes gaps in the current global food system, Canada released a joint statement alongside other nations stating that food security depends on local resilience and supporting small-scale farmers, harvesters, and processers with planting, harvesting, and the fair and safe sale of products (9). Farmers Markets, like the Yellowknife Farmers Market (YKFM), have been ambitiously situated as a means to support a sustainable local food system and a mechanism to promote prosperity (4,5,7,13,15,16).…”

“…Farmers Markets are de ned by their capacity to build direct connections and 'short circuit' the conventional food system by bringing farmers and community members together in the sale of locally-produced food (3,10,11). These markets are no longer, however, considered a panacea to solve all the environmental and social problems of conventional agriculture and food systems (5,(11)(12)(13). They are community food spaces with the potential to connect communities and producers, provide infrastructure to support small sustainable farms, and support resilient integrated systems that are essential in times of crisis (9,10,(14)(15)(16).…”

Entangled alternatives: political-economic conditions constructing farmer training programs as solutions to the farming crisis

“…This study aims to contribute to the debate in political ecology on the possibilities of alternative food practices (AFNs) for radical socio-environmental transformation (Alkon and Agyeman 2011;Blumberg et al 2020;Calvário and Kallis 2016;Giraldo and Rosset 2018). Political ecology has called for re-interpreting and representing ecological problems (Forsyth 2003;Robbins 2004), and more recently, solutions to those problems (as in Cavanagh and Benjaminsen 2017;Guthman 2011;McCarthy 2006).…”