Food Relocalization for Environmental Sustainability in Cumbria

Abstract

Abstract:In the past decade, many European farmers have adopted less-intensive production methods replacing external inputs with local resources and farmers' skills. Some have developed closer relations with consumers, also known as short food-supply chains or agro-food relocalization. Through both these means, farmers can gain more of the value that they have added to food production, as well as greater incentives for more sustainable methods and/or quality products, thus linking environmental and economic sustainability. These systemic changes encounter difficulties indicating two generic needs-for state support measures, and for larger intermediaries to expand local markets. The UK rural county of Cumbria provides a case study for exploring those two needs. Cumbria farmers have developed greater proximity to consumers, as a means to gain their support for organic, territorially branded and/or simply ‗local' food. This opportunity has been an incentive for practices which reduce transport distances, energy costs and other inputs. Regional authorities have provided various support measures for more closely linking producers with each other and with consumers, together developing a Cumbrian food culture. Going beyond the capacity of individual producers, farmer-led intermediaries have maintained distinctive product identities in larger markets including supermarket chains. Although Cumbria's agro-food relocalization initiatives remain marginal, they counteract the 1990s trend towards delocalization, while also indicating potential for expansion elsewhere.

Examination of Short Supply Chains Based on Circular Economy and Sustainability Aspects

“…In many cases, producers' participation in SFSC is motivated by interdependence, self-employment [13], or by selling directly to the consumer at better prices, avoiding retail and wholesale trade [67]. In this way, they can receive a higher return on the value of the products [68]. Short chains have the opportunity to offer more value-added from producers [9].…”

Practices of Food Sovereignty in Italy and England: Short Food Supply Chains and the Promise of De‐Commodification

“…Our research suggests that ‘entering’ the alternative food economy entails a radical transformation of producers’ commercial strategies: de‐aligning production practices from the needs and mechanisms of the conventional food chain calls for the search for new market avenues for farm products, ones that may enable farmers to appropriate a greater share of value‐added and involve a lesser degree of market‐dependency (Fligstein and Dauter ). This is where short chains and AFNs come into play: their underlying functional logics and operational mechanisms support the trend (to a certain extent and with significant differences which are context‐dependent – see, for concrete examples, Martindale et al ()) of the development of a different agriculture, which is characterised by a focus on quality (Goodman ), a less accentuated industrial pattern, and arguably a greater level of social and environmental sustainability (Vorley ; Levidow and Psarikidou ; Psarikidou and Szerszynski ; Marsden and Morley ).…”

“…Intertwined with the historical geo‐political fragmentation of the country, this set of conditions allowed for the resistance of a diversity of farming traditions and reduced the scope of the processes of concentration and intensification upon which the modernisation of agriculture was based (Fonte and Cucco ). In the UK instead, no such cultural ‘brakes’ were put on the capitalistic development of the sector, which therefore reached a higher level of industrialisation and commodification (Levidow and Psarikidou ; Guiomar et al ). The ranks of the British ‘peasantry’ were almost emptied out, whereas in Italy, despite a significant reduction in the economic weight of the primary sector and the subsequent process of rural depopulation, a lively peasant culture managed to resist.…”

“…In Italy, the discourse revolved around the protection of national production because it was deemed to be synonymous with quality and craftsmanship by consumers and institutions alike (Brunori et al ). Arguably, this better prepared the ground for a more economic‐oriented reception of the later ‘alternative turn’ – that is, the diffusion of discourses of food system re‐localisation in opposition to the predatory forces of long chains – than in the UK, where instead the ‘quality turn’ was addressed with stricter food safety regulations and further agro‐industrial concentration (Levidow and Psarikidou ).…”

Vehicles Allocation for Fruit Distribution Considering CO2 Emissions and Decisions on Subcontracting

“…Although harder emission controls on vehicles have reduced harmful gas emissions, attention has shifted towards the growth of CO 2 emissions from the cargo transport sector [8,49]. In recent years, the development and application of operations research models in supply chains of perishable products have attracted many researchers in different countries [1].…”