Dear Jane, Stewart and fellow conference attendees,

The 18^th annual Agri-food research network conference which was held at ANU from the 5^th to the 8^th of December 2011 was the first of many I hope to attend.  The theme for the conference was ‘sustainabilities, justice and agriculture in the Asia-Pacific region’, with various sessions relevant to this title on the program.

On the first morning I was very excited about the discussion ahead and was told that it was nice to see the ‘family’ back together.  I had never come across this term being use in academic circles before and thought it may have been a feel-good remark with little substance.  And then the presentations began.  Sustainable agriculture, corporate food, multifunctionality, indigenous food networks, and food security were themes in some of the sessions I was lucky enough to attend and be a part of over the next three days, concerning pressing issues in the agri-food realm. In his keynote address Philip McMichael explained that the ‘land grabbing’ agricultural regime had now become central to the capitalist, neoliberal paradigm society is currently based on.  Geoffrey Lawrence echoed concern in his presentation on the financialisation of the agri-food system, due to the collapse of other markets, and outlined the social and environmental consequences this may have.  Hilde Bjorkhaug, however, had already explained that even progressive nation’s like Norway still needed to invest their wealth somewhere, creating a cyclical nightmare!  And so the globally dominant, self-nourishing socio-economic system continues to evolve, perhaps albeit depressingly for the reluctant neoliberalists among us. 

So while there were, at times, depressing moments of realisation to come out of research presented, which supported conclusions I myself had come to previously and would love to ignore, during the discussion at the end of day one I realised most of ‘us’ were in the same boat.  We were questioning the current way society is structured, the consequences of this structure, and essentially the notion that the monetary economy dictates social and environmental outcomes.  However, the fact that this concern can lead to ‘us’ pragmatically devoting our lives to bringing these issues to light was, to me at least, an exciting prospect.  To have the psychological power to step back from my day-to-day life and question both my existence and the way society interacts is something that while, at times being quite disturbing, is the thing that gives me most pride.  To find a group that shares my concerns (and many others that I don’t understand yet and may never will) with our agri-food system made me feel at home.  So by the end of the conference, while not in a biological sense, as both a noun and adjective the term ‘family’ or a ‘familiar tribe’ seemed quite apt.

Thanks again must go to the convenors, Jane and Stewart, and the entire network, for your support, for your contributions to my work, and for putting on a great conference.  I must also mention the gracious financial support I received to cover travel expenses from my supervisor, Douglas Bardsley, without which I would not have been able to attend.  Also while thanking a political party for turning up to a conference that addresses issues that are integral to the future survival of their voters may not be fitting, I feel the Greens senator affiliates that made the effort to attend should be recognised.  If for no other reason than because it selfishly made me more optimistic about the future of Australian politics.  I hope to see you all again in 2012!

Cheers and Happy Holidays,

Simon  Fielke

PhD Candidate

Geography, Environment & Population

University of Adelaide, SA, 5005

Email: simon.fielke@adelaide.edu.au

The Symposium will examine the issue of food production, distribution and consumption from a range of social science perspectives. Among the issues to be explored are:

• An overview of the Prime Minister’s Science, Engineering and Innovation Council (PMSEIC) report Australia and Food Security in a Changing World , from a social science perspective.
• A social-science based appraisal of the food system in Australia in the context of the PMSEIC report.
• The concept of food security and its relevance to Australia.
• Pathways from production through distribution to consumption.
• Climate change and food production, with special reference to the Murray-Darling Basin.
• The food production workforce.
• Pressures on the inputs to food production.
• Systems of distribution and cultures of consumption including the role of supermarkets in food distribution.
• Food security in remote Indigenous communities, including community stores and their role in the health of remote Indigenous communities and the Mai Wiru program.

Food security is about a basic human right, our right to nutritious, sustainably produced and affordable food. It has, however, become a tremendously complex problem with many of the stakeholders seeing the issues only from their own narrow perspectives. Here, Jane Dixon pleads for a more holistic approach.

Since the global food crisis of 2007-2008, when prices soared for staple commodities, there has been renewed interest in global and national food security. In Australia the debates continue, fuelled by speculation as to diminishing food productivity as a result of a decade-long drought followed by successive natural disasters affecting the country’s major food bowls in Southern Queensland and Victoria’s Goulburn Valley.

Sandwiched between these events, the Prime Minister’s Science, Engineering and Innovation Council recommended a national food security agency be established. Meanwhile, the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry established…

Full Article Here

5-8 December 2011, Australian National University, Canberra

Overview

Agri-Food XVIII is the annual meeting of the Australasian Agri-Food Research Network. The Agri-Food Network was established in 1992 to provide a forum for researchers engaged in the critical analysis of contemporary agri-food systems. It is designed to facilitate and maintain the exchange of information amongst researchers in the Asia-Pacific region, to encourage collaborative research, to engage policy makers and other professionals, and to organise conferences and meetings. As with all annual meetings of the Network, potential participants are invited to submit abstracts on any aspect of the social and political life of food. Submissions that directly address the conference theme, however, are particularly welcome.

As extreme weather events, accelerating foreign acquisitions of agricultural land, and uncertainty over the magnitude and timing of future climate change impacts combine to put food security back on the political agenda in developed countries such as Australia and New Zealand, it is timely to consider questions such as:

• The impact of these trends on food security and population health more broadly within the region.

• The role of Australia and New Zealand as exporters of food, knowledge and expertise in regional food security.

• The respective roles of the state and private sectors in production, trade and consumption.

• The challenges and opportunities posed for national strategies by private sector regulation.

Sustainabilities, justice and agriculture in the Asia-Pacific region highlights the inter- related dynamics of national and regional food security, environmental and livelihood sustainability, and the agri-food governance frameworks operating across the region.

For more details and to submit proposals please go to the OFFICIAL CONFERENCE WEBSITE

Abstracts

Abstracts are due by October 31, 2011. All abstracts will be read by at least two members of the Conference Program Committee.

Program and venue

Details regarding keynote speakers, the conference dinner, a potential pre-conference tour and other events will be available shortly.

Further details

For more information, or to register your interest in receiving full conference details, please contact the School of Sociology at the Australian National University via email at sociology@anu.edu.au.

Convenors:

Professor Stewart Lockie, School of Sociology ANU

Associate Professor Jane Dixon, National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health ANU

For more details and to submit proposals please go to the OFFICIAL CONFERENCE WEBSITE

The studentships will support one year’s research training on an M.Res programme in the first instance. Satisfactory progress will lead to three year’s further support for a PhD.  The studentships are worth €21,000 per annum including registration fees, and are subject to to the Teagsac Walsh Fellowship Scheme terms and conditions.

Project Outline

Agricultural extension processes are essentially about knowledge and knowledge exchange. This project will employ novel methods to analyse knowledge exchange processes in agricultural extension activities and to assist in improving them. Sociological research has demonstrated that different forms of knowledge are at play in agricultural extension processes: farmers’ knowledge, advisors’ knowledge, scientists’ knowledge and so on. The literature shows how interactions between these different forms of knowledge, and the nature of the social relationships that underpin them, are of critical importance in agricultural extension processes. Understanding the knowledge forms, knowledge interactions and social relationships at play in agricultural extension is central to shaping successful extension processes that give rise to practical and acceptable outcomes for farmers, the end-users. This project is designed to use Participatory Action Research (PAR) to understand and mobilise different forms of knowledge, interactions and relationships, in order to give rise to innovative solutions to farmer’s technical and economic challenges through the extension process.

The project will consist of three linked components: (i) an empirical, systemic study of knowledge transfer in extension practice in Ireland, in order to develop an analytical framework to understand farmers’ decision making in relation to technology adoption. This will inform (ii) a programme of participatory action researchsited in Teagasc Discussion Groups, Teagasc Farm Walks and Teagasc Monitor farms, employing novel methodologies to improve knowledge exchange in agricultural extension. The findings of the action research will be shared through (iii) a participatory communication strategy, developed in concert with the action research stakeholders (i.e. biological scientists, advisors and farmers) to have a broad impact across Teagasc’s extension system. This will be complemented by high quality academic publications.

One project will address social and institutional capital in the extension systems, while the other will focus on the applications of technology to mediate participation and social learning.

More Information Here

In a context of the Queensland floods and cyclone and the floods in Victoria, many analysts have been asking questions about Australia’s food security. These severe weather events, which have destroyed the capacity of hundreds of fruit growers and pastoralists to deliver food for at least a season, have understandably overshadowed several significant policy decisions which will have long term consequences for Australia’s food producers and consumers.

Over the last six months, the national government has disappointed a wide spectrum of groups with its food security initiatives. The first was a narrowly constituted National Food Policy Working Group to advise the federal Minister of Agriculture on the food and farming sector’s priorities. Then, Australia’s Biosecurity Services Group announced that it would permit the importation of apples from China because it was satisfied that the produce would not pose any biosecurity risk. More recently, Biosecurity Australia has alerted the nation’s fruit growers that it will accept New Zealand’s standard orchard…

Full Article Here

Opinion feature article written by Agri-Fooders, Michael Santhanam-Martin and Geoff Lawrence.

Greens leader Bob Brown’s concern over acquisitions by China’s Shenhua Watermark Coal of farms on NSW’s Liverpool Plains is but the latest flurry in a gathering storm of controversy over mining developments on farmland.

Whether it’s coal seam gas or coal, the question is whether the loss of some of our most productive farmland to mining threatens national food security.

World Vision’s Tim Costello takes a broader view and asserts that there is a global “ethical interest” involved.

Should we be worried?

Food security? It’s in the (free market) bag

According to the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences (ABARES), we shouldn’t be concerned. It recently concluded that “Australia is able to produce sufficient food to meet its needs and has the income to achieve…

Full Article Here

More information here.

Since the beginning of the 1990s the emphasis of participatory democracy has become stronger in Finnish policy- and decision-making. This development involves various stakeholders participating in negotiations, or more specifically deliberations, around current issues in order to reach consensus and enable a continuance in the policy process. According to research, the more consensual a democracy is the more favourable are the policy outcomes towards environmental issues. The three case studies investigated, i.e. the Forest Biodiversity Programme for Southern Finland, the Action Plan for Renewable Energy, and the Natura 2000 Network of European Union nature protection areas, support this notion. The case studies are focused on how the key players involved have conceived the decision-making process in terms of achieved goals and degree of agreement as well as on the specific issue context as a backdrop to the development of policy. The cases displayed significant differences of outcomes depending on the achieved level of consensus and deliberation. The outcomes are further analysed within the theoretical frameworks of Lijphart’s ‘consensus vs majoritarian model of democracy’ and Jänicke’s ‘consensual capacity for ecological modernisation’. The analysis opens up prospects for further comparative research of the dynamics of environmental policy development within an Australasian-Nordic context.

Australian consumers enjoy a cheap and diverse diet because of modern developments within the food supply chain. But the costs of our contemporary cuisine cultures include diet-related health problems, declining farming communities and a dislocation between consumers and their local food production. This paper presents the dramatic peri-urban narrative of Bilpin and Kurrajong orchards on Sydney’s north-west rural fringe. Once a thriving farming community of over 80 orchards, the area is now home to only 12 orchards, about 6 of which continue to sell their produce on Sydney’s Central Market. At the core of this changing landscape is the loss of economic profitability of horticulture in Sydney. Both contributing to and symptomatic of this central issue emerge a range of difficulties including high land prices, conflict with rural ‘lifestyle’ residents, contestation over water rights, rising farm costs, increasing regulation and surveillance and, competition from international imports. The authors discuss different local attempts to reestablish economic profitability and social significance, including a move towards re-regionalisation (Donald et al 2010).