Anglais

Articles

• Urban governance for food security : the alternative food system in Belo Horizonte
  23 novembre 2021, par Mathilde COUDRAY

  With a population of 2.5 million people, the city of Belo Horizonte, Brazil, is a world pioneer in tackling food consumption, distribution and production as components of an integrated urban policy for food security. The paper gives a description of the main programmes and features of this policy arguing that over 15 years the city and its Municipal Secretariat for Food Policy and Supply have built a particular alternative food system. Marked by the comprehensive scope of its programmes ; its urban/rural focus ; the flexibility of the initiatives and, above all, by its commitment to social justice and equitable access to food, Belo Horizonte has developed a distinct mode of governance for food security. The unique ‘alterity’ of this food system is set further apart from those being attempted in Europe and in North America because it is government-driven. The paper discusses its strengths and current challenges.

• 19/ Hidden costs and the fair price of our food: between the market, the State and the commons
  15 September 2022, by Mathilde COUDRAY

  Jean-Louis Rastoin, L’Institut Agro Montpellier, France
  Key points The market price of food products reflects only a limited share (between a third and half) of their true cost if we take into account the negative externalities associated with their production, distribution and consumption. These harmful impacts pertain to human health (50% of hidden costs on average), the environment (30%), and the economy (20%). These figures vary due to the territorial diversity of food systems. (...)

• 2021 /Atelier "Nourrir les imaginaires" - Saison Africa2020
  13 avril 2021, par Mathilde COUDRAY

  Africa2020 est un projet panafricain et pluridisciplinaire, centré sur l’innovation dans les arts, les sciences, les technologies, l’entrepreneuriat et l’économie. Cette Saison inédite a cherché à favoriser les mobilités, à mettre à l’honneur les femmes dans tous les secteurs d’activité et à cibler en priorité la jeunesse.

• Charlas culinarias : Mexican women speak from their public kitchens
  3 novembre 2021, par Mathilde COUDRAY

  By exploring how working-class Mexican women transform their home cooking abilities into an economic resource to support themselves and their families, this paper looks at the philosophical approach women give to their entrepreneurial efforts.

• Limited food availability
  3 novembre 2021, par Mathilde COUDRAY

  While food security is a major worldwide issue, it is a much more serious problem in Low-Income
  (LI) and Lower Middle-Income (LMI) countries. Currently, sub-Saharan Africa is the sub-continent with the highest proportion of undernourished people, the largest gap between current and potential yields, and between cereal consumption and production. Looking to the future, population growth and climate change may worsen the situation, particularly in Africa. African countries are still facing rapid population growth with uncertain prospects about the ability of their agriculture to meet growing food demand. In addition, without sufficient adaptation measures, climate change will negatively impact food production in most African regions.

• 21/ Child undernutrition in Guatemala: aggravating factors and levers
  29 September 2022, by Mathilde COUDRAY

  – Juliana Yael Milovich, Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative, United Kingdom Elena Villar, Department of Economics and Finance, Catholic University of Milan, Italy
  Key points The aggressive expansion of African palm farming in Guatemala is exacerbating chronic child undernutrition by jeopardizing families’ access to sufficient food. Nutritional health programmes that operate at local level and involve all community members are particularly effective in reducing child (...)

• The practice and politics of food system localization
  3 novembre 2021, par Mathilde COUDRAY

  As an apparent counterpoint to globalization, food system localization is often assumed to be a good, progressive and desirable process. Such thinking rests on a local–global binary that merits closer scrutiny. This paper examines the social construction of “local”, by analyzing the practice and politics of food system localization efforts in Iowa, USA. It argues that desirable social or environmental outcomes may not always map neatly onto the spatial content of “local”, which itself involves the social construction of scale. These contradictions in turn relate to differing political inflections discernible in food system localization. Localization can be approached defensively, emphasizing the boundaries and distinctions between a culturally and socially homogeneous locality needing protection from non-local “others”. But through the experience of new social and gustatory exchanges, localization can also promote increased receptivity to difference and diversity. More emergent, fluid and inclusive notions of the “local”, however, may challenge the very project of crafting and maintaining distinctive food identities for local places. These themes are explored through a case study of food system localization efforts and activities in Iowa, an American state that has been a stronghold of conventional commodity agriculture. Demographic and agricultural histories are drawn on to understand recent food system localization practice that has come to emphasize a definition of “local” that coincides with sub-national state boundaries. The emergence and popularization of the “Iowa-grown banquet meal” and the shifting meaning of “local Iowa food” further illustrate the potential tension between defensiveness and diversity in food system localization.

• The place of food : mapping out the ‘local’ in local food systems
  3 novembre 2021, par Mathilde COUDRAY

  ‘Local food systems’ movements, practices, and writings pose increasingly visible structures of resistance and counter-pressure to conventional globalizing food systems. The place of food seems to be the quiet centre of the discourses emerging with these movements. The purpose of this paper is to identify issues of ‘place’, which are variously described as the ‘local’and ‘community’ in the local food systems literature, and to do so in conjunction with the geographic discussion focused on questions and meanings around these spatial concepts. I see raising the profile of questions, complexity and potential of these concepts as an important role and challenge for the scholar-advocate in the realm of local food systems, and for geographers sorting through them. Both literatures benefit from such a foray. The paper concludes, following a ‘cautiously normative’ tone, that there is strong argument for emplacing our food systems, while simultaneously calling for careful circumspection and greater clarity regarding how we delineate and understand the ‘local’. Being conscious of the constructed nature of the ‘local’, ‘community’ and ‘place’ means seeing the importance of local social, cultural and ecological particularity in our everyday worlds, while also recognizing that we are reflexively and dialectially tied to many and diverse locals around the world.

• What’s on the menu ? A global assessment of MUFPP signatory cities’ food strategies. Agroecology and Sustainable Food Systems
  23 novembre 2021, par Mathilde COUDRAY

  Increased recognition of the persistent and interconnected nature of food system challenges resulted in the creation of the Milan Urban Food Policy Pact (MUFPP) in 2015. MUFPP signatory cities commit themselves to contribute to a better functioning food system by adopting integrated approaches. This study assesses the number of MUFPP cities that have developed food strategies and the choices local policymakers make in the design of these strategies. The results show surprising similarities between cities across regions in terms of goals and instruments. At the same time, local governments clearly put different emphases and seem to vary in policy styles.

• Understanding Lived Experience of Food Environments to Inform Policy : An Overview of Research Methods
  10 novembre 2021, par Mathilde COUDRAY

  With poor diets being the leading cause of ill-health in the world today, the imperative to explore how to leverage food systems for better diets has never been greater. Significant attention has been placed on how to improve one particular component of the food system : food environments. Food environments comprise the foods available to people in their surroundings as they go about their everyday lives and the nutritional quality, safety, price, convenience, labelling and promotion of these foods (FAO, 2016).