Organising Alternative Food Networks (AFNs): Challenges and Facilitating Conditions of different AFN types in three EU countries

Abstract

This study aimed to explore the constraining and facilitating factors impacting the emergence and consolidation of different types of alternative food networks (AFNs) in different countries. Drawing on the expertise of organizers of seventeen AFNs, we investigated the conditions and actors that hinder and promote the development of different types of AFNs in Poland, Portugal and the Netherlands. Using a multi-actor perspective framework, we categorized six types of AFNs according to their logic and characteristics: consumer-led, producer-led, third-sector led, community supported agriculture, public-led, and business platforms. Key challenges and facilitating conditions varied according to AFN type, and depended on AFN particularities. In contrast to the Netherlands, low social capital was commonly cited as a challenge in Portugal and Poland. AFN organizers appeared to exercise innovative power when creating new forms of food provision; however, a wide scope of actions by governmental and non-governmental actors are needed to support the emergence of more AFNs.

Know the Farmer That Feeds You: A Cross-Country Analysis of Spatial-Relational Proximities and the Attractiveness of Community Supported Agriculture

“…CSA members slightly disagree that their CSA should collaborate with dominant actors to encourage them to become more sustainable. CSA members might lack trust toward dominant food system actors (i.e., lack of social proximity) [21] and may be afraid of too much dependence and organizational control by the latter [48,73].…”

“…Although closer links to non-CSA actors, such as government and public institutions, could generate additional resources for CSAs, they may also lead to a loss of independence [73]. Operationalizing the proximity dimensions for the CSA context and a literature review on CSAs in Austria, Japan, Norway, and beyond helped to make assumptions about how the different proximity dimensions might affect CSAs and their attractiveness in these countries.…”

Understanding the market potential of products from alternative food networks in a transition economy—a discrete choice experiment

“…The production mode was found to be a very important purchasing criterion. The heavily negative utility of industrial production, compared to organic or traditional production, corresponds to the strong negative perception of mass-produced foods in other transition economies (Poças Ribeiro et al. , 2021).…”

“…Alternative food networks (AFN) emerged in the 1990s as a response to perceptions that the industrial food system had become increasingly unethical (Edwards, 2016). AFNs involve both alternative food practices and means of distribution and include, for example, farm sales, farmers' markets, vegetable box schemes and community supported agriculture (Poças Ribeiro et al. , 2021).…”

You Are Where You Eat: A Theoretical Perspective on Why Identity Matters in Local Food Groups

“…However, as alternative foods are now also sold and distributed through supermarkets (Maye and Kirwan, 2010), "alternative" in this context refers to non-conventional forms of food production, processing, and supply. Local food systems typically comprise small-scale alternatives and collaborations in different organizational forms or activities (see Table 1) embedded in local landscapes (Fonte, 2008;Brunori et al, 2012;Hinrichs, 2014;Poças Ribeiro et al, 2021).…”