Aquatic food security:insights into challenges and solutions from an analysis of interactions between fisheries, aquaculture, food safety, human health, fish and human welfare, economy and environment

Fisheries and aquaculture production, imports, exports and equitability of distribution determine the supply of aquatic food to people. Aquatic food security is achieved when a food supply is sufficient, safe, sustainable, shockproof and sound: sufficient, to meet needs and preferences of people; safe, to provide nutritional benefit while posing minimal health risks; sustainable, to provide food now and for future generations; shock-proof, to provide resilience to shocks in production systems and supply chains; and sound, to meet legal and ethical standards for welfare of animals, people and environment. Here, we present an integrated assessment of these elements of the aquatic food system in the United Kingdom, a system linked to dynamic global networks of producers, processors and markets. Our assessment addresses sufficiency of supply from aquaculture, fisheries and trade; safety of supply given biological, chemical and radiation hazards; social, economic and environmental sustainability of production systems and supply chains; system resilience to social, economic and environmental shocks; welfare of fish, people and environment; and the authenticity of food. Conventionally, these aspects of the food system are not assessed collectively, so information supporting our assessment is widely dispersed. Our assessment reveals trade-offs and challenges in the food system that are easily overlooked in sectoral analyses of fisheries, aquaculture, health, medicine, human and fish welfare, safety and environment. We highlight potential benefits of an integrated, systematic and ongoing process to assess security of the aquatic food system and to predict impacts of social, economic and environmental change on food supply and demand

Trade and exchange

If the history of Mediterranean trade during the period c800-1200 is one of decline and reluctant recovery that of Northern Europe is decidedly one of growth. One reason for this is the different points of departure. By c700, Europe’s northern seas had never witnessed a system of exchange on the scale and complexity of that in the Mediterranean during Antiquity. During the following centuries, however, the development of commerce in the North corresponded ever closer to that of the Mediterranean, resulting in a twelfth-century economy no less advanced or extensive than that of Imperial Rome, but within an even wider geographical frame. Intriguingly, and hardly by accident, this process was set in motion at the very moment when the Late Antique economy ceased in the Mediterranean, in the closing decades of the seventh century. Throughout much of the period concerned here, trade remained a modest appendage to traditional forms of exchange. Its key historical importance was as a steady motor of social change and innovation

Competing and Learning in Global Value Chains - Firms’ Experiences in the Case of Uganda. A study of five export sub-sectors with reference to trade between Uganda and Europe

Executive Summary and Chapter 5: Presentation and discussion of main finding

Nineteenth-Century Bahia\u27s Passion for British Salted Cod: From the Seas of Newfoundland to the Portuguese Shops of Salvador\u27s Cidade Baixa, 1822-1914

Dried cod has played a similar role to sugar in the international chain of commerce. It became a major traded commodity between British North America (Newfoundland, Nova Scotia Gaspe) in the nineteenth century. Cheap cod fed the slaves who grew and produced the sugar (and coffee and cotton) which in turn energised the workers of the Industrial Revolution who worked the machines which made the commodities of empire. The machines in factories and their output provided the material basis of Empire. Sugar and cod were important in the cultures of Britain, Newfoundland, the West Indies, West Africa and Brazil. Demand (tastes) and (low) price dictated that salted cod would become a main staple in the West Indies and Brazil even though ample supplies of fresh fish existed locally

The Rise of Supermarkets and Vertical Relationships in the Indonesian Food Value Chain: Causes and Consequences

This paper reviews the causes of the emergence of modern retailing and the vertical relationships in the Indonesian food value chain, and the consequences of these changes on market organization and value distribution. The findings of this paper suggest that there are both demand- and supply-side factors that contribute to the emergence of modern retailing. The evolution of vertical relationships between farmers and modern retailers observed in Indonesia is a direct response to risks and quality uncertainty. In the vertical relation, large-scale retailers may earn a monopsonistic rent, and there are risks of exclusion of small-scale farmers from the emerging food value chain. However, there are alternative channels through which farmers may sell their products, albeit at a lower price compared to the modern channels, and measures can be instituted to protect them against monopsonistic rents. The findings have important policy implications for developing countries.supermarkets, retailing, Indonesia, food value chain

Knowledge, Food and Place: a way of producing a way of knowing

The article examines the dynamics of knowledge in the valorisation of local food, drawing on the results from the CORASON project (A cognitive approach to rural sustainable development: the dynamics of expert and lay knowledge), funded by the EU under its Framework Programme 6. It is based on the analysis of several in-depth case studies on food relocalisation carried out in 10 European countries

Fisheries agreements under Lomé convention

Originally, the Lomé convention aimed to be the framework for genuine development cooperation between the Old Continent and its former colonies. It was an instrument which, without being a cure for all ills, provided substantial guarantees for countries that had been exhausted by years of economic, political and cultural domination by Europe. However, from the 80's onwards, the demands made by neo-liberalism and the priority given to the market economy overrode the research effort and support deployed in favour of autonomous and balanced development of countries which nevertheless make up a majority of the so-called "lesser developed countries" (LDC's). The fishery Accords in particular, despite the financial compensation they bring with them and the additional aid for training and research, do not contribute to any real development of ACP countries' fisheries. There is a simple reason for this: they are commercial, rather than development agreements. They are a god-send for the industrial fleets of the European Community which, thanks to the Accords, are granted the enormous advantage of being able to exploit for their own profit waters which are rich in both fish and shell-fish of high commercial value. Without these Accords, the fishing fleets of the rich countries of Europe would be forcibly laid up and their crews dismissed on account of the over-fishing in Northern waters. Moreover, the aid for research and training is largely piecemeal and the stipulations of the Accords are by no means obeyed as they should be. For example, very few fishermen from ACP countries have found a berth on board European Community vessels for training purposes, as the Lome Convention gives them the right to expect. The new Lome Accords signed in 1990 give no reason to believe that the EC is moving towards a more committed policy of development cooperation. The economic demands of the 1993 Single Market, the channelling of aid towards the new democracies in the East, the search for more lucrative markets with more credit-worthy partners... are all ominous portents for the world's poorest countries. After being the most colonial of continents in the history of mankind, can it be that present-day Europe, or what will very soon become of it with the probable integration of certain countries from the East, is once again going to miss one of the great opportunities of History? As the third millenium dawns, Europe is being given a great chance : to make a full assessment of the poor countries' demo-graphic importance in the very near future, and to reply generously to their most basic needs. From this point of view, the development of small-scale fisheries in Third World countries is a vital issue. Will Europe meet this challenge? The future of relations between North and South is at stake. (53pp.