Global food systems and food security
Information from the course leader
Dear all
The course 'Global Food Systems and Food Security' starts on Thursday 25 March. All teaching and seminars of the course will be online, transmitted through the communication tool Zoom. We will use the same Zoom link and password throughout the entire course
The lectures will be held on Mondays 10.15-12.00 and 13.15-15.00 and the seminars on Thursdays (except when an occasional lecture or seminar clashes with a holiday). There will also be a couple of extra lectures on Tuesdays.
You will be divided into either a morning or afternoon seminar group on Thursdays.
The literature are uploaded on Canvas, except for the books that you have either to purchase or borrow. See the literature list.
The schedule, the reading instrructions for each week, as well as the literatuer list are also uploaded below this text.
Welcome!
Örjan and Kristina
Global Food Systems and Food Security:
Schedule and reading instructions
Spring semester 2021
Örjan Bartholdson
orjan.bartholdson@slu.se
Kristina Marquardt
kristina.marquardt@slu.se
The course runs 11 weeks and consist of two lectures (4 hours) and one seminar per week.
Lectures will be held on Mondays 10.15-12.00 and 13.15-15.00, except for the first week, which starts with an introduction and two lectures on Thursday 25 March. Seminars will be held on Thursdays. Exceptions to this pattern depends on the occurrence of public holidays.
All lectures and seminars will be held on Zoom.
The main lecturers on the course are:
Örjan Bartholdson, a Swedish anthropologist, whose research mainly has been focused on rural and urban issues in Latin America, including issues of deforestation and food production in the Amazon. He is also the course convener.
Kristina Marquardt is Associate Professor in Rural Development. Her research focuses on smallholders' diverse and dynamic land uses for food production, agrarian change, forest transitions and maintenance of ecosystem services in the landscape. She has researched during many years in Peru and Nepal. Kristina is also assistant course convener.
Kjell Hansen, a Swedish-Norwegian ethnologist, who is an expert on issues of rural development, governance and social theory. Kjell has researched on various aspects related to rural development in Sweden.
Adam Pain, a British scholar, who is an expert on development, food security and global food systems. Adam has researched extensively in both Africa and Asia.
Theme 1: Food and Water Security
Week 12: 25 March – 26 March: Introduction of the course
Thursday 25 March
09.15 - 10.00
Presentation of the course
Course convener: Örjan Bartholdson
10.15-12.00
Introductory lecture, Presenting the concepts global food systems and food security.
Discussants: Adam Pain, Kjell Hansen and Örjan Bartholdson
Required reading
Christoplos Ian and Adam Pain (eds). (2015) Chapter 1: Introduction. Chapter 2: Food Security and Food Crisis. New Challenges to Food security. From climate change to fragile states. Routledge. Pages 1-38
Clapp, Jennifer (2016) Chapter 1: Unpacking the World Food Economy. Food. Polity Books (2nd edition). Pages 1-25.
Hall, Derek. Chapter 1: Introduction. Land. Cambridge. Polity Press. Pages 1-23.
McMichael, P (2013) Chapter one: The Food Regime Project. Food Regimes and Agrarian Questions. Agrarian Change and Peasant Studies Series, Practical Action. Fernwood Publishing. Pages 1-20.
Ó Gráda, Cormac (2009) Chapter 1: The Third Horseman: Famine: A Short History. Princeton University Press. Pages 1-44.
Pain, Adam & Hansen Kjell (2019). Chapter 1, 2, 3, 4: Rural Development. New York & London: Routledge.
13.15-15.00
Food and water security and the dynamics of change: historical examples
Lecturer: Adam Pain
Required reading
Clapp, Jennifer (2016) Chapter 2: The Rise of a Global Industrial Food Market. Food. Polity Books (2nd edition). Pages 26-60
McMichael, P (2013) Chapter two: Historical Forms of the Food Regime. Chapter four: Food Regimes and the Agrarian Question. Food Regimes and Agrarian Questions. Agrarian Change and Peasant Studies Series, Practical Action. Fernwood Publishing. Pages 21-40, 62-83.
Ó Gráda, Cormac (2009) Chapter 3: Prevention and Coping. Chapter 5: Markets and Famine. Chapter 6: Entitlements: Bengal and Beyond: Famine: A Short History. Princeton University Press. Pages 61-89; 159-194.
Scott, James, C (2017) Introduction: A Narrative in Tatters: What I Didn't Know. Chapter 4: Agroecology of the Early State. Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States, Yale University Press. Pages 1-35; 116-149
15.15-16.30
Discussion of the meaning and content of global food systems and food security.
Discussants: Adam Pain, Kjell Hansen and Örjan Bartholdson
Friday 26 March
10.15-12.00, 13.15-15.00
Discussion seminar
Week 13: 29 March – 1 April: Food and water security and the case of Afghanistan
Monday 29 March
10.15-12.00
Food and water security and the dynamics of change: globalisation
Lecturer: Adam Pain
Required reading
Christoplos Ian and Adam Pain (eds.). (2015) Chapter 10: Poverty, food security and local water conflicts in southern Zambia. New Challenges to Food security. From climate change to fragile states. London: Routledge. Pages 184-199
Clapp, Jennifer (2016) Chapter 2: The Rise of a Global Industrial Food Market. Chapter 5: Financialization of Food. Food. Polity Books (2nd edition). Pages 26-60; 133-169
McMichael, P (2013) Chapter six: Crisis and Restructuring. Food Regimes and Agrarian Questions. Agrarian Change and Peasant Studies Series, Practical Action. Fernwood Publishing. Pages 109 - 130
13.15-15.00
National Food Systems: the case of Afghanistan:
Lecturer : Adam Pain
Required reading:
Christoplos Ian and Adam Pain (eds). (2015) Chapter 3: Scenarios for global agriculture and food security towards 2050: A review of recent studies. Chapter 4: Strengthening food security through human rights: A moral and legal imperative and practical opportunity. Chapter 7: Food insecurity in fragile states and protracted crises. Chapter 9: Food insecurity and agricultural rehabilitation in post-conflict northern Uganda. Chapter 12: Social inequality and food insecurity in Nepal: Risks and responses. Chapter 14: Food security and insecurity in Afghanistan. New Challenges to Food security. From climate change to fragile states. Routledge. Pages 39-84, 123-140, 166-183, 221-240, 258-278
Pain, Adam & Hansen Kjell (2019). Chapter 3. Rural Development. London: Routledge.
Thursday 1 April
10.15-12.00, 13.15-15.00
Discussion seminar
Week 14: 6 April – 9 April. Food crisis and flex crops.
Tuesday 6 April
10.15-12.00
The 2008 Food Crisis: the case of Afghanistan
Lecturer: Adam Pain
Required reading
Pain, Adam & Hansen Kjell (2019). Chapter 5. Rural Development. London: Routledge.
Sen, Amartya. 1981. Poverty and Famines. Essays on Entitlement and Deprivation. Chapter 1-2: Poverty and Entitlement, 4: Starvation and Famines, 6: The Great Bengal Famine. Oxford. Clarendon Press. Pages: 1-23, 39-85
Land, T (2010) Crisis? What Crisis? The Normality of the Current Food Crisis. Journal of Agrarian Change, 10 (1): 87-97
13.15-15.00
The introduction of so called flex crops.
Lecturer: Adam Pain
Required reading
Borras et al. 2014. Towards Understanding the Politics of Flex Crops and Commodities. Transnational Institute (TNI) Agrarian Justice Program.
Borras et al. 2016. The rise of flex crops and commodities: implications for research. The Journal of Peasant Studies, 43, 1, 93-115
Thursday 8 April
10.15-12.00,
13.15-15.00
Discussion seminar
Week 15: 12 April – 16 April. From subsistence to cash crops
Monday 12 April
10.15-12.00
Smallholder farming systems – contentions and combinations of subsistence and cash crops. The case of San Martín Peru. understanding farming systems.
Lecturer: Kristina Marquardt
Required reading
Marquardt K, Pain A, Bartholdson Ö and L Romero Rengifo (2019). Forest dynamics in the Peruvian Amazon – understanding processes of change. Small-scale Forestry. 18(1), pp 81-104. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11842-018-9408-3
13.15-15.00
Smallholder landscapes - land use practices and dynamics of change. The case of Nepal.
Lecturer: Kristina Marquardt
Required reading
Marquardt K, Pain A and Khatri D B (2020). Re-reading Nepalese landscapes: labour, water, farming patches and trees. Forests, Trees and Livelihoods: 29:4. 238-259.
DOI:10.1080/14728028.2020.1814875
Thompson M and Warburton M (1985). Uncertainty on a Himalayan Scale. Mountain Research and Development, Vol. 5, No. 2, pp. 115-135.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/3673250
Thursday 15 April
10.15-12.00
13.15-15.00
Discussion seminar
Theme 2: Markets, commodity chains, local impacts and resistance
Week 16: 19 April – 23 April. Global food chains and markets.
Monday 19 April
10.15-12.00
Markets and the commodification of agriculture
Lecturer: Örjan Bartholdson
Required reading
[Clapp, Jennifer (2016) Chapter 2: The Rise of a Global Industrial Food Market. Food. Polity Books (2nd edition). Cambridge: Polity Press ]
Gregory, C.A. 2000. Chapter 1: The value question. Savage Money. The Anthropology and Politics of Commodity Exchange. London: Routledge
Minola, Giulia & Adam Pain. 2015. Peeling the Onion. Social Regulation on the Onion Market, Nangarhar, Afghanistan. Economic & Political Weekly, February
Pritchard, Bill; Gracy C.P; Godwin, Michelle 2010: The Impacts of Supermarket Procurement on Farming Communities in India: Evidence from Rural Karnataka. Development Policy Review, 28
13.15-15.00
Global Food Chains: From production to consumption: wheat, rice, soy beans, coffee, etc
Lecturer: Örjan Bartholdson
Required reading
Topik, Steven, A. Wells. 2012. Chapter 3: Commodity Chains. Global Markets Transformed 1870-1945. The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. Pages 113-259
Thursday 22 April
10.15-12.00, 13.15-15.00
Discussion seminar
Week 17: 26 April – 29 April. The effects of markets and migration on local life-worlds.
Monday 26 April
10.15-12.00
International markets and local effects
Lecturer: Örjan Bartholdson
Required reading
Mintz, Sidney W. Introduction, Chapter 1, Chapter 2. Sweetness and Power. The Place of Sugar in Modern History. .New York. Penguin Books. Pages xv - 73.
Nützenadel, Alexander (2008) Chapter 9: A green international? Foods market and transnational politics, 1850-1914. Chapter 12: Postcolonial paradoxes: the cultural economy of African Export Agriculture. Chapter 14: Before Fair Trade Empire, Free Trade and the moral economies of food in the modern world. Food and Globalization. Consumption, Markets and Politics in the Modern World (ed. Nützenadel, Alexander, Trentmann, Frank). Oxford. Berg. Pages: 153-172, 215-234, 253-276
13.15-15.00
Rural livelihoods and political systems. Mobility and migration.
Lecturer: Kjell Hansen
Venue: Lecture room J
Required reading
Gould, William T. S. 2009. Chapter 6: Migration and Development. Population and Development. London: Routledge. Page 154 - 190
Kelsall, Tim. 2011.Going with the Grain in African Development. Development Policy Review 29.
Pain, Adam & Hansen Kjell (2019). Chapter 8. Rural Development. London: Routledge.
Tuesday 27 April
10.15-12.00
How to work with certifications and social and environmental sustainability
Lecturer: Kristina Bjurling
Sustainability manager on the wholesale corporation Axfood
Thursday 29 April
10.15-12.00, 13.15-15.00
Discussion seminar
Week 18: 3 May – 7 May. Social and cultural contexts of food insecurity and organized resistance
Monday 3 May
10.15-12.00
The social and cultural context of food insecurity: the case of Brazil.
Lecturer: Örjan Bartholdson
Required reading
Scheper-Hughes, Nancy. 1992. Chapter 1: O Nordeste: Sweetness and Death. Chapter 2: One hundred years without water. Chapter 4: The madness of hunger. Death without Weeping. The Violence of Everyday Life in Brazil. Berkeley. University of California Press. Pages 31-97, 128-166
13.15-15.00
Popular resistance and change. Social movements and NGOs
Lecturer: Örjan Bartholdson
Required reading
Hall, Derek. 2013. Chapter 6: Social movements. Land. Cambridge. Polity Books. Pages 139-166.
Hilhorst, Dorothea Chapter 1: Introduction: The politics of NGO-ing. Chapter 2: Damning the dams: Social movements and NGOs The Real World of NGOs: discourses, diversity and development. London. ZED Books. Pages 1-50.
Lechner, Frank, J., Boli, John (2005) Chapter 7: Transforming World Culture: The anti-globalization movement as cultural critique. World Culture. Origins and Consequences. Oxford. Blackwell Publishing. Pages 153-172
Pain, Adam & Hansen Kjell (2019). Chapter 8. Rural Development. London: Routledge.
Thursday 6 May
10.15-12.00
13.15-15.00
Discussion seminar
Week 19: 10 May – 12 May. Rural institutions and their global and regional contexts.
Monday 10 May
10.15-12.00:
Rural institutions: the state vs. the private sector
Lecturer: Kjell Hansen
Required reading
Clapp, Jennifer. 2016. Chapter 3: Agricultural Trade Liberalization. Chapter 4: Transnational corporations. Food. Cambridge. Polity Books (2nd edition). Pages 61-132
McMichael, Philip 2013: Chapter 3: The Corporate Food Regime. Chapter 6: Crisis and Restructuring; chapter 7: The Food Regime and Value Relations: Which Values? Food Regimes and Agrarian Questions. Halifax. Fernwood Publishing.
Pain, Adam & Hansen Kjell (2019). Chapter 6. Rural Development. London: Routledge.
13.15-15.00
World System and World Culture Theories: International division of labor, consumption and political ecology
Lecturer: Örjan Bartholdson
Required reading
Mintz, Sidney W. Introduction, Chapters 3 - 5. Sweetness and Power. The Place of Sugar in Modern History. .New York. Penguin Books. Pages 74 - 214
Harvey, David. 2006. Notes towards a theory of uneven geographical development. Spaces of Global Capitalism. Towards a theory of uneven geographical development. London. Verso. Pages 69-116.
Wednesday 12 May
10.15-12.00, 13.15-15.00
Discussion seminar
Theme 3: International policy as food security frameworks
Week 20: 17 May – 21 May. Global institutional frameworks
Monday 17 May
10.15-12.00
Global institutional frameworks: WB, IMF, WTO, EU, etc. How international agreements frame food systems
Lecturer: Kjell Hansen
Required reading
Bernstein, H., 2006. 'Is There an Agrarian Question in the 21st Century?' Canadian Journal of Development Studies, 26 (4): 449–60.
Chang, Ha-Joon. 2009. Rethinking public policy in agriculture – Lessons from history, distant and recent. Journal of Peasant Studies, 36, 3, 477-515
Clapp, Jennifer 2016: Chapter 4, 5, 6: Food Cambridge: Polity Press. Pages 96-200
Pain, Adam & Hansen Kjell (2019). Chapter 7. Rural Development. London: Routledge.
13.15-15.00.
Food in a globalized world
Lecturer: Kjell Hansen
Required reading
Benson, Peter & Fischer, Edward F. 2007. Broccoli and Desire. Antipode.
Tsing, Anna. 2012. Unruly Edges: Mushrooms as Companion Species for Donna Haraway. Environmental Humanities. Vol.1: 141-154
Thursday 20 May
10.15-12.00, 13.15-15.00
Discussion seminar
Week 21: 24 May– 28 May. Bureaucracies and meat and fish commodities.
Monday 24 May
10.15-12.00
Hybrid bureaucracies and territories. Entrepreneurs and social trust
Lecturer: Kjell Hansen
Required reading
Graeber, David. 2006. Beyond Power/Knowledge- an exploration of the relation of power, ignorance and stupidity. The Malinowski Memorial Lecture, 2006. HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory. Pages 105 – 128
Gupta, Akhil 1995: Blurred Boundaries: The Discourse of Corruption, the Culture of Politics, and the Imagined State. American Ethnologist 22.
Lund, Christian 2006: Twilight Institutions: Public Authority and Local Politics in Africa. Development and Change 37
Pain, Adam & Hansen Kjell (2019). Chapter 9. Rural Development. London: Routledge.
13.15-15.00.
The ethnography of pork production
Lecturer: Örjan Bartholdson
Required reading
Blanchette, Alex. Introduction and Part 1. 2020. Porkopolis. American Animality, Standardized Life & the Factory Farm. Durham. Duke University Press. Pages 1 – 72.
Tuesday 25 May
10.15-12.00
COVID-19 and the destabilised seafood system: Tracing global seafood commodity chains from producers in Thailand to markets
Lecturer: Alin Kadfak
Required reading
Marschke, Melissa, Vandergeest, Peter, Havice, Elizabeth, Kadfak, Alin, Duker, Peter, Isopescu, Ilinca, MacDonnell, Mallor. 2020. COVID-19, instability and migrant fish workers in Asia. Maritime Studies. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40152-020-00205-y
13.15-15.00
Herding cattle in the mid-West: The ethnography of a cowgirl.
Lecturer: Andrea Petitt
Required reading
To be announced later
Thursday 27 May
10.15-12.00
13.15-15.00
Discussion seminar
Week 22: 31 May – 4 June: Land and food security
Monday 31 May
10.15-12.00
The effects of migration on food production in rural Nepal
Lecturer: Dil Khatri
13.15-15.00
Summing up of the course
Discussants: Örjan Bartholdson, Kristina Marquardt and Kjell Hansen
Week 22 Home exam
Deadline Sunday 6 June, 23.59 pm
Literature
You will only have to purchase the books marked with a *.
Please, note that some literature might be added to the list and some may be changed or omitted.
Compulsory course books
* Clapp, Jennifer (2016) Food. Cambridge. Polity Books (2nd edition).
* Christoplos Ian and Adam Pain (eds). (2015) New Challenges to Food security. From climate change to fragile states. Routledge.
* Hall, Derek. 2013. Land. Cambridge. Polity Books.
* Mintz, Sidney W. Introduction, Chapter 1, Chapter 2. Sweetness and Power. The Place of Sugar in Modern History. .New York. Penguin Books
* Pain, Adam & Hansen Kjell (2019). Rural Development. New York & London: Routledge.
Excerpts of Books:
Blanchette, Alex. Introduction and Part 1. 2020. Porkopolis. American Animality, Standardized Life & the Factory Farm. Durham. Duke University Press.
Gregory: The value question (chap 1: Gregory C.A. 2000: Savage Money. The Anthropology and Politics of Commodity Exchange. London: Routledge
Gould, William T. S. 2009: Chapter 6: Migration and Development. Population and Development. London: Routledge (pp 154 - 190)
Harvey, David. 2006. Notes towards a theory of uneven geographical development. Spaces of Global Capitalism. Towards a theory of uneven geographical development. London. Verso. Pages 69-116.
Hilhorst, Dorothea Chapter 1: Introduction: The politics of NGO-ing. Chapter 2: Damning the dams: Social movements and NGOsThe Real World of NGOs: discourses, diversity and development. London. ZED Books. Pages 1-50.
Lechner, Frank, J., Boli, John (2005) Chapter 7: Transforming World Culture: The anti-globalization movement as cultural critique. World Culture. Origins and Consequences. Oxford. Blackwell Publishing. Pages 153-172
Nützenadel, Alexander (2008) Chapter 9: A green international? Foods market and transnational politics, 1850-1914. Chapter 12: Postcolonial paradoxes: the cultural economy of African Export Agriculture. Chapter 14: Before Fair Trade Empire, Free Trade and the moral economies of food in the modern world. Food and Globalization. Consumption, Markets and Politics in the Modern World (ed. Nützenadel, Alexander, Trentmann, Frank). Oxford. Berg. 153-172, 215-234, 253-276.
Scheper-Hughes, Nancy. 1992. Chapter 1: O Nordeste: Sweetness and Death. Chapter 2: One hundred years without water. Chapter 4: The madness of hunger. Death without Weeping. The Violence of Everyday Life in Brazil. Berkeley. University of California Press. Pages 31-97, 128-166.
Sen, Amartya. 1981. Poverty and Famines. Essays on Entitlement and Deprivation. Chapter 1-2: Poverty and Entitlement , 4: Starvation and Famines, 6: The Great Bengal Famine. Oxford. Clarendon Press. Pages: 1-23, 39-85
Scott, James, C (2017) Introduction: A Narrative in Tatters: What I Didn't Know. Chapter 4: Agroecology of the Early State. Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Earliest States, Yale University Press. Pages 1-35; 116-149
Topik, Steven, A. Wells. (2012) Global Markets Transformed 1870-1945. Chapter 3: Commodity Chains. The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. Pages 113-259
Wolf, Eric (1973) Chapter 3: China. Peasant wars of the twentieth century. New York. Harper Torchbooks.Pages 103-158.
Wolf, Eric (1982) Europe and the People without History. Part Two: chapter 7: The Slave Trade. Berkeley. University of California Press. Pages 195-231
Articles:'
Bartholdson, Örjan (2017) How to Talk Back: The impact of bureaucracy and brokers on a community based forest management project in the Brazilian Amazon. Forum for Development Studies
Benson, Peter & Fischer, Edward F. 2007. Broccoli and Desire. Antipode.
Bernstein, H., 2006. 'Is There an Agrarian Question in the 21st Century?' Canadian Journal of Development Studies, 26 (4): 449–60.
Borras et al 2014. Towards Understanding the Politics of Flex Crops and Commodities. Transnational Institute (TNI) Agrarian Justice Program.
Borras et al, 2016 The rise of flex crops and commodities: implications for research. The Journal of Peasant Studies, 43, 1, 93-115
Chang, Ha-Joon. 2009. Rethinking public policy in agriculture – Lessons from history, distant and recent. Journal of Peasant Studies, 36, 3, 477-515
Graeber, David. 2006. Beyond Power/Knowledge- an exploration of the relation of power, ignorance and stupidity. The Malinowski Memorial Lecture, 2006. HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory. Pages 105 – 128
Gupta, Akhil 1995: Blurred Boundaries: The Discourse of Corruption, the Culture of Politics, and the Imagined State. American Ethnologist 22.
Kelsall, Tim 2011: Going with the Grain in African Development. Development Policy Review 29.
Land, T (2010) Crisis? What Crisis? The Normality of the Current Food Crisis. Journal of Agrarian Change, 10 (1): 87-97'
Lund, Christian 2006: Twilight Institutions: Public Authority and Local Politics in Africa. Development and Change 37
Marquardt K, Pain A, Bartholdson Ö and L Romero Rengifo (2019). Forest dynamics in the Peruvian Amazon – understanding processes of change. Small-scale Forestry. 18(1), pp 81-104. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11842-018-9408-3
Marquardt K, Pain A and Khatri D B (2020). Re-reading Nepalese landscapes: labour, water, farming patches and trees. Forests, Trees and Livelihoods: 29:4. 238-259.
DOI:10.1080/14728028.2020.1814875
Minola, Giulia & Adam Pain 2015: Peeling the Onion. Social Regulation on the Onion Market, Nangarhar, Afghanistan. Economic & Political Weekly, febr. 2015.
Marschke, Melissa, Vandergeest, Peter, Havice, Elizabeth, Kadfak, Alin, Duker, Peter, Isopescu, Ilinca, MacDonnell, Mallor. 2020. COVID-19, instability and migrant fish workers in Asia. Maritime Studies. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40152-020-00205-y
Pritchard, Bill; C.P. Gracy & Michelle Godwin 2010: The Impacts of Supermarket Procurement on Farming Communities in India: Evidence from Rural Karnataka. Development Policy Review, 28.
Thompson M and Warburton M (1985). Uncertainty on a Himalayan Scale. Mountain Research and Development, Vol. 5, No. 2, pp. 115-135.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/3673250
Tsing, Anna. 2012. Unruly Edges: Mushrooms as Companion Species for Donna Haraway. Environmental Humanities. Vol.1: 141-154
Course evaluation
The course evaluation is now closed
LU0092-40106 - Course evaluation report
Once the evaluation is closed, the course coordinator and student representative have 1 month to draft their comments. The comments will be published in the evaluation report.
Additional course evaluations for LU0092
Academic year 2023/2024
Global food systems and food security (LU0092-40156)
2024-03-20 - 2024-06-02
Academic year 2022/2023
Global food systems and food security (LU0092-40064)
2023-03-22 - 2023-06-04
Academic year 2021/2022
Global food systems and food security (LU0092-40119)
2022-03-24 - 2022-06-05
Academic year 2019/2020
Global food systems and food security (LU0092-40043)
2020-03-25 - 2020-06-07
Academic year 2018/2019
Global food systems and food security (LU0092-40095)
2019-03-26 - 2019-06-09
Syllabus and other information
Syllabus
LU0092 Global food systems and food security, 15.0 Credits
Globala försörjningssystem och matsäkerhetSubjects
Rural DevelopmentEducation cycle
Master’s levelModules
Title | Credits | Code |
---|---|---|
Single module | 15.0 | 0101 |
Advanced study in the main field
Second cycle, has only first-cycle course/s as entry requirementsMaster’s level (A1N)
Grading scale
The grade requirements within the course grading system are set out in specific criteria. These criteria must be available by the course start at the latest.
Language
EnglishPrior knowledge
Knowledge equivalent to 180 credits, including 90 credits within a particular major within humanities, social or natural sciences. Knowledge equivalent to English 6 (Swedish educational system).Objectives
The aim of this course is to provide the students with an understanding of global food chains, i.e. how food is produced, marketed, distributed and perceived at global and local levels. The course will discuss how food systems are globally interconnected while at the same time food production also is part of local sustenance. Attention will be given to issues of global equilibrium and disequilibrium in both production and consumption, with a focus on how food systems are embedded in economic, social, cultural and political environments. The course will enable students to analyze the conditions required to achieve food security and the contemporary challenges caused by climate change, as well as economic, political and social tendencies and pressures. The course will provide students with knowledge and abilities needed both in postgraduate research and in professions focusing on global food systems and food security.
After completion of the course, the student should be able to:
Understand and analyze the production and marketing of agricultural and animal products on regional and global scales; as well as how these scales are connected economically, politically and socially.
Understand and account for the historical transformation from subsistence agriculture to agro-industrialization, and its effect on agricultural producers and communities.
Understand and analyze how international political relations and the gradual internationalization of markets have affected food production, marketing, transportation and consumption.
Understand and analyze the meaning of food security, how food security is dependent on ecological, economic, political and social factors how changes in these factors influence the emergence of the right to food movement and risk jeopardizing food security.
Understand and account for social theories that aim to analyze global changes and connections of food production, marketing, transportation and consumption, such as world system theory, food regime theory and political ecology.
Content
This course introduces students to global food systems and the challenges of ensuring food security for all in a world of climate change, globalization, shifting demographies and new technologies. Food constitutes a major product in the contemporary global commodity value chain and this course provides students with analytical tools so as to be able to grasp and analyze the effects of global forces on local food production, on marketing, transportation and consumption of food. This course draws on theories and methods from sociology, social anthropology, human geography, economy, political science and agro-ecology. The course will enable students to critically analyze contexts, perspectives and the spatiality of the global food systems and food security, as well as distinct strategies of moral interventions, for example the development of certifications and the movement right to food.
Grading form
The grade requirements within the course grading system are set out in specific criteria. These criteria must be available by the course start at the latest.Formats and requirements for examination
Approved home exam, approved participation in compulsory seminars and approved written assignments.
- If a student has failed an examination, the examiner has the right to issue supplementary assignments. This applies if it is possible and there are grounds to do so.
- The examiner can provide an adapted assessment to students entitled to study support for students with disabilities following a decision by the university. Examiners may also issue an adapted examination or provide an alternative way for the students to take the exam.
- If this syllabus is withdrawn, SLU may introduce transitional provisions for examining students admitted based on this syllabus and who have not yet passed the course.
- For the examination of a degree project (independent project), the examiner may also allow the student to add supplemental information after the deadline for submission. Read more in the Education Planning and Administration Handbook.
Other information
The right to participate in teaching and/or supervision only applies for the course instance the student was admitted to and registered on.
If there are special reasons, students are entitled to participate in components with compulsory attendance when the course is given again. Read more in the Education Planning and Administration Handbook.
Responsible department
Department of Urban and Rural Development
Further information
Grading criteria
Grading criteria for the course 'Global Food Systems and Food Security' of the Master's Programme; Rural Development and Natural Resource Management.
Course code LU 0092.
Course learning objectives
The aim of the course is to provide students with an understanding of global food chains, i.e. how food is produced, sold, distributed and apprehended on global and local levels. The course discusses how food systems are linked globally, while food production simultaneously is part of local livelihoods. The course deals with questions of global balances and imbalances in production and consumption with a specific focus on how food systems are integrated into social, cultural, and political contexts. The course provides students with abilities to analyze the challenges caused by climate change as well as economic, political and social challenges as well as what is needed to establish food security. The course gives students knowledge and capabilities needed for further studies as well as professions centering on global food systems and food security.
After finishing the course students should be able to:
- understand and analyze production and marketing of agricultural products on regional a global levels, and understand how the global and the regional is intertwined;
- understand and analyze the historical transformation of agriculture from subsistence to industry, and the effects of these transformations on producers and communities;
- understand and analyze how international political relations and the globalization of markets have influenced food production, marketing, transportation and consumption;
- understand and analyze the importance of food security and its dependence on ecological, economic, political and social factors;
- understand and discuss the social theories needed to analyze global changes in food production, marketing, transportation and consumption.
Examination and demands for approval (grade 3):
The course is graded through a written home exam. The students are required to obtain a minimum number of points to pass the examination.
In order to pass the course students must also participate actively in weekly discussion seminars.
Comments to the grading criteria:
Using the learning objectives as a frame, the following areas of assessment are being used to evaluate the quality of the exam:
The ability to combine empirical material/descriptions with analytical reasoning
The ability to analyze
The ability to coherently understand and deal with complex questions
The ability to describe and analyze the importance of theorizing for understanding the complexity of global food systems and food security
The ability to produce a scientific and well-written text
The grading criteria should be regarded as comprehensive descriptions of different levels of quality. The assessment of the totality is the most important factor. This means that single weaknesses within one area to be assessed may be balanced by strengths in other areas. The grading criteria specifies the minimum level to achieve a specific grading level (3 - 5).
Grading criteria
3. In writing: be able to account for different aspects of and perspectives on global food systems and food security, according to the specified learning objectives of the course.
Participate actively in weekly discussion seminars.
4. In writing: be able to account for, compare or evaluate different aspects of and perspectives on global food systems and food security, according to the specified learning objectives of the course.
Participate actively in weekly discussion seminars.
5. In writing: be able to account for, compare, evaluate and theorize on different aspects of and perspectives on global food systems and food security, according to the specified learning objectives of the course.
Participate actively in weekly discussion seminars.
Litterature list
- Literature list Kommentar: Dear all
The literature list and instructions are found at the end of the schedule.