ABSTRACT

In response to the challenges of a growing population and food security, there is an urgent need to construct a new agri-food sustainability paradigm. This book brings together an integrated range of key social science insights exploring the contributions and interventions necessary to build this framework. Building on over ten years of ESRC funded theoretical and empirical research centered at BRASS, it focuses upon the key social, economic and political drivers for creating a more sustainable food system.

Themes include:

  • regulation and governance 
  • sustainable supply chains 
  • public procurement 
  • sustainable spatial strategies associated with rural restructuring and re-calibrated urbanised food systems 
  • minimising bio-security risk and animal welfare burdens.

The book critically explores the linkages between social science research and the evolving food security problems facing the world at a critical juncture in the debates associated with not only food quality, but also its provenance, vulnerability and the inherent unsustainability of current systems of production and consumption. Each chapter examines how the links between research, practice and policy can begin to contribute to more sustainable, resilient and justly distributive food systems which would be better equipped to ‘feed the world’ by 2050.

chapter 1|29 pages

Current food questions and their scholarly challenges

Creating and framing a sustainable food paradigm

chapter 2|32 pages

Food futures

Framing the crisis

chapter 3|22 pages

European food governance

The contrary influences of market liberalization and agricultural exceptionalism

chapter 4|19 pages

The public plate

Harnessing the power of purchase

chapter 5|19 pages

Sustainable food supply chains

The dynamics for change

chapter 6|21 pages

Biosecurity and the bioeconomy

The case of disease regulation in the UK and New Zealand

chapter 7|23 pages

Improving animal welfare in Europe

Cases of comparative bio-sustainabilities

chapter 8|20 pages

Exploring the new rural—urban interface

Community food practice, land access and farmer entrepreneurialism

chapter 9|20 pages

The ‘new frontier'?

Urban strategies for food security and sustainability

chapter 10|16 pages

Conclusions

Building the food sustainability paradigm: research needs, complexities, opportunities