The food system refers to all of the processes and infrastructures that are required to get food from fields to our mouths.
Historically, food systems were relatively simple. They might have consisted of a hunter or farmer providing food directly for their family, with very little waste.
Today, they are much more complex. They involve, for example, growing, processing, financing, packaging, warehousing and storage, transportation, brokerages, retail, marketing, consumption and disposal of food and waste. Perhaps the only thing that has not changed is the eating. We eat together, we talk about what we eat and we share recipes. Social gatherings and food have always been inseparable. Cooking and eating are social activities. But what about the rest of the food system?
Too often, the rest of the food system is viewed purely as a technical activity. It is complex and often invisible to us as consumers, offering us little opportunity to participate. We do not give it much thought and assume that the cogs and wheels are operating behind the scenes as long as food appears on our supermarket shelves.
Yet there are many social relationships among food producers, workers, suppliers, processors, brokers, wholesalers, retailers and consumers, in particular places that allow for the exchange of food, information and resources. These exchanges determine how food gets from fields to plates and the way it is valued.
Advocates for more sustainable food systems suggest that thinking of the food system as a social activity is critical for strengthening the viability and vibrancy of alternative food systems. It reinforces the fact that the existing food system is not preordained, but open to change at any point.
The value of thinking of the food system as a social activity is particularly apparent when the cogs and wheels behind the scenes are not working. Then we see people working together to refashion parts of the food system to suit their needs.
One recent example of this has emerged in Dunedin with the overwhelming interest expressed in a food co-operative to provide fruit and vegetables at cheaper prices by relying on social networks and volunteers.
A similar approach was used by a small group of women in Tokyo in 1965 who established a buying club that led to the creation of the Seikatsu Consumer Co›op (SCC). The aim of the SCC was not simply to expand members' access to healthy and more affordable food, but to contribute to the food system infrastructure that producers could use to put their agricultural practices on a more profitable and environmentally sustainable footing.
The SCC has since grown into a union of 32 autonomous place› based co›operatives throughout Japan with over 350,000 members and annual sales approaching $1 billion.
By making the social relationships explicit throughout the food system, the SCC provides producers with a stable customer base and builds relationships, trust and solidarity between consumers and producers. Agreements between the SCC and producers provide opportunities to negotiate fair prices for producers, while also shifting production practices to match the values and concerns of SCC members.
The SCC example and many others like it demonstrate that thinking of the food system less as a technical process of moving food around and more as a social activity provides opportunities for each of us to create the food system we want.
- Sean Connelly is a lecturer in the department of geography at the University of Otago.
