Agriculture and food in the globalization age

Abstract

The objective of this article is to reflect on three basic questions concerning globalization and its effects on agriculture and food: 1) what are the major characteristics of globalization; 2) who are its major actors and 3) what are the future trends? Globalization continues to be a disputed concept despite the immense literature dedicated to it. I will focus on features of the current globalization process that can be employed to better understand the direction and reach of changes, particularly in agriculture and food.1 It is not my goal to produce original contributions about the theoretical relevance and accuracy of globalization or about its scale and scope. I will use a theoretical framework based on a political economy perspective focusing on the global agents, their logic and dynamics. However, this must be tempered by calling attention to the agencies and contingencies involved in the process. In fact, political economy insights suggesting global lines of evolution are not contradictory but rather complementary to actor-oriented, actor-network theory and social constructivist approaches, which acknowledge the social agencies and the complex articulations of the different spaces involved in agro-food production and consumption (Llambí et al. 1999, Goodman and Watts 1997). The second section deals with the major characteristics of globalization. Since this is a subject that has been treated extensively in the globalization literature, I will avoid unnecessary repetitions and concentrate on highlighting features focusing on the economic and political dimensions of globalization that I consider indispensable, in order that the importance of the phenomenon may be better understood. Focusing on the global agro-food system in the third section, the relevant features of the major actors of the globalization process will be identified along with their different logics and dynamics and their relationships with local actors. In the fourth section a framework is proposed to consider future trends in agriculture and food based on the concepts of substitutionism, appropriationism and the technological treadmill by using a two-scenario approach: one that explores the deepening of the current trends and another, considering a globalization backlash. In addition, some conclusive remarks will be drawn in the fourth section