Food systems sustainability : an examination of different viewpoints on food system change

Global food insecurity levels remain stubbornly high. One of the surest ways to grasp the scale and consequence of global inequality is through a food systems lens. In a predominantly urban world, urban food systems present a useful lens to engage a wide variety of urban (and global) challenges—so called ‘wicked problems.’ This paper describes a collaborative research project between four urban food system research units, two European and two African. The project purpose was to seek out solutions to what lay between, across and within the different approaches applied in the understanding of each city’s food system challenges. Contextual differences and immediate (perceived) needs resulted in very different views on the nature of the challenge and the solutions required. Value positions of individuals and their disciplinary “enclaves” presented further boundaries. The paper argues that finding consensus provides false solutions. Rather the identification of novel approaches to such wicked problems is contingent of these differences being brought to the fore, being part of the conversation, as devices through which common positions can be discovered, where spaces are created for the realisation of new perspectives, but also, where difference is celebrated as opposed to censored

Urban food systems as vehicles for sustainability transitions

Strategies and action plans for sustainable food provisioning and urban food security are in progress in many urban regions both in the global North and South. A number of urgent challenges need to be confronted such as increasing uncertainty and unpredictability related to stronger dependence on a global market for food import, ongoing political unrest and environmental conflicts, increasing resource scarcity and climate warming making food production hazardous. There is an increased vulnerability with respect to food security for human societies, both in developing and developed countries. The food security dimension of access to healthy food is related to equality and poverty and is relevant for cities in the North via the segregation challenges. The food system issue is well-suited for assessing sustainable development since food provisioning is both a multiscale and cross-sectorial issue and thus addresses more than the three dimensions of social, economic and environmental sustainability. How is the planning for sustainable food strategies in urban regions in Europe concordant with the United Nations Global Sustainable Development Goals and with the transition towards sustainable futures? This paper deliberates on using the food system issues for sustainability transition, drawing on the forthcoming 2018 IPBES (Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services) work on pathways for sustainable futures and a recent survey of existing urban food system strategies. Against this background, some reflections are given relevant for the ongoing work on a local urban food strategy for the city of Gothenburg, Sweden

Preface

A woman sewing.https://egrove.olemiss.edu/keat_peo/1172/thumbnail.jp

Natural resource conflicts and sustainable development

Providing both a theoretical background and practical examples of natural resource conflict, this volume explores the pressures on natural resources leading to scarcity and conflict. It is shown that the causes and driving forces behind natural resource conflicts are diverse, complex and often interlinked, including global economic growth, exploding consumption, poor governance, poverty, unequal access to resources and power. The different interpretations of nature-culture and the role of humans in the ecosystem are often at the centre of the conflict. Natural resource conflicts range from armed conflicts to conflicts of interest between stakeholders in the North as well as in the South. The varying driving forces behind such disputes at different levels and scales are critically analysed, and approaches to facilitate and enforce mediation, transformation and collaboration at these levels and scales are presented and discussed. In order to transform existing resource conflicts, as well as to decrease the risk of future conflicts, approaches that enhance and enforce collaboration for sustainable development at global, regional, national and local levels are reviewed, and sustainable pathways suggested. A range of global examples is presented including water resources, fisheries, forests, human-wildlife conflicts, urban environments and the consequences of climate change. It will be a valuable text for advanced students of natural resource management, environment and development studies and peace and conflict management. The book will also be of interest to practitioners in the field of natural resource management

THE INTERRELATIONSHIP OF BIODIVERSITY AND RURAL VIABILITY: SUSTAINABILITY ASSESSMENT, LAND USE SCENARIOS AND NORWEGIAN MOUNTAINS IN A EUROPEAN CONTEXT

The decline and restructuring of agriculture is particularly evident in mountain areas, leading to forest recolonisation on former mountain pastures threatening biodiversity and landscape qualities, and the appeal of the mountain landscape for recreation and tourism. Land use change scenarios based on different agri-environmental incentives were developed for the Jotunheimen mountains, Norway, in collaboration with local stakeholders. Sustainability assessments of the scenarios underscored the connections between landscape, biodiversity and local cultural heritage as the fundament for the development of local enterprises for tourism and niche production. Biodiversity values solely, were not considered to be of major importance by the stakeholders.Agri-environmental policies, landscape-ecological models, livestock grazing, local participation, semi-natural habitats, BioScene