Reskilling for sustainability: A perspective from comparative ethnography on collective food procurement

Abstract

We complete this thematic issue's contribution on skill, food, and sustainability with a team report based on ethnographic research which focuses on reskilling for sustainability in multiple European locations and involving diverse social actors and stakeholders. The Food Citizens? project (2017-2024) is a comparative ethnographic analysis of collective food procurement networks and phenomena in European cities. Three Ph.D. candidates, two post docs, and one principal investigator -all trained as anthropologists -have worked on it in various phases and roles -from developing the project framework and conducting fieldwork to designing the project's i-doc (www.foodcitizens.eu). The project's principal investigator (Cristina Grasseni) has co-edited this kritisk etnografi thematic issue 'Is Europe skilling for sustainable food?', and one team member (Maria Vasile) is among the article authors. Team research had four foci of analysis -diversity, solidarity, skill and scale -and sought to explore them ethnographically, in the cities of Gdańsk (Poland), Rotterdam (the Netherlands) and Turin (Italy) in particular. Each of the team members brought ethnographic experience to the research process, including previous and ongoing research on solidarity economies, alternative food networks, and food heritage in European regions such as Croatia, Catalonia and northern Italy.Skill was one of the main research foci, asking which societal formations emerge or become visible around food provisioning (particularly at the level of urban foraging, short food chains and local food governance), and what roles skill and enskilment play in them. For the purposes of the project, skill was explored as the acquisition, transmission and performance of relevant expertise -as well as its absence or loss -not only in growing food, but also in managing food chains, setting governance agendas and collaborating within and across food networks. Skills were analysed as something that developed in relation to context-specific cultural, political and economic phenomena and as a means to observe these in terms of their practical unfolding. Operationally, ethnographic investigation was led by specific questions, namely: Which relevant skills do participants in collective food procurement have, and which do they lack? Which skills repertoires do their networks develop, and which expertise do they need for it? Do food procurement networks make