TWN Info Service on Sustainable Agriculture
20 December 2024
Third World Network
www.twn.my
Dear Friends and Colleagues
How Agroecology Can Transform Food Systems and Advance Farmers’ Autonomy
The complete integration of food systems within global capitalism and their subordination to profit accumulation represents the principal systemic driver behind the current polycrisis and the loss of food producers’ autonomy. This article illustrates how this subordination has strong environmental and social consequences for consumers and society at large.
Agroecology is a solution that can help reorient food systems away from profit accumulation and enhance producers’ autonomy, while mitigating environmental and social dysfunction. The authors stress how the transformative power of agroecology lies in its double nature: concrete (technical) and social (political), and that it cannot be reduced to a purely technical intervention.
Expanding agroecology will require two types of efforts. At the international level, this will require a common struggle on the part of producers (and consumers) to exert stronger control on the production, processing, and distribution of food. At the local level, it will require the ability to develop democratically controlled solutions adapted to different social and ecological contexts.
We reproduce below the Summary and Conclusions of the article.
With best wishes,
Third World Network
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TRANSFORMING FOOD SYSTEMS THROUGH AGROECOLOGY: ENHANCING FARMERS’ AUTONOMY FOR A SAFE AND JUST TRANSITION
M Graziano Ceddia, Sébastien Boillat, Johanna Jacobi
The Lancet Planetary Health
Volume 8, Issue 11, E958-E965
www.thelancet.com/journals/lanplh/article/PIIS2542-5196(24)00234-1/fulltext?rss=yes
November 2024
Summary
Food systems contribute to multiple crises while failing to deliver healthy, nutritious food for all. A substantial amount of research suggests that the root cause of this issue lies in the complete integration of food systems within global capitalism and the consequent subordination of fairness and sustainability to profit accumulation. We draw on critical political economy to explore how the integration of food systems within global capitalism and their subordination to profit occur. Subsequently, we illustrate how this subordination erodes the autonomy of food producers, with strong environmental and social consequences for consumers and society at large. Lastly, we discuss how agroecology could transform food systems and enhance producers’ autonomy, while mitigating environmental and social dysfunction. We stress how the transformative power of agroecology lies in its double nature: concrete (technical) and social (political). By acting in both dimensions, agroecology can help reorient food systems away from profit accumulation and towards better meeting community needs, in line with the tenets of food sovereignty.
[….]
Conclusions
The complete integration of food systems within global capitalism and their subordination to profit accumulation represents the principal systemic driver behind the current polycrisis and the loss of food producers’ autonomy. This integration is achieved through the penetration of capitalist relations of production within food systems, the appropriation by capital of the upstream and downstream sectors of food systems, the indirect control of farming, and the consequent revolution in the forces of food production. Transforming food systems to address the polycrisis and increase farmers’ autonomy will require a weakening, if not dissolving, of the prevailing capitalist relations of production within food systems and a reshaping of productive forces. Agroecology could represent an important strategy in this direction, which would allow producers to reappropriate portions of the upstream and downstream sectors of food systems. The transformative power of agroecology lies in its double nature: concrete or technical and social or political.
The two dimensions of agroecology stand in dialectical relationship to each other. By acting on the concrete or technical dimension, agroecology also alters social relations of productions. The reduction of external inputs on the farm increases the autonomy of producers from upstream operators, weakens the penetration of capitalist social relations, and helps emancipate producers from the compulsion to pursue profit accumulation. By acting on the social or political dimension, agroecology can enable the adoption of new production methods that respond to local social and environmental conditions. By improving access to resources and by directly controlling distribution, through cooperatives and local markets serving both rural and urban areas, the production and consumption of agroecological products is also promoted. The two examples discussed in this Personal View illustrate concretely how agroecology can work. Expanding agroecology will require two types of efforts. At the international level, this expansion will require a common struggle (eg, coordinated through international organisations such as La Via Campesina) on the part of producers (and consumers) to weaken the penetration of capitalist relations of production by exerting a stronger control on the production, processing, and distribution of food. At the local level, it will require the ability to develop democratically controlled solutions adapted to different social and ecological contexts. These final considerations therefore stand as a warning against attempts (by transnational corporations, opportunistic non-governmental organisations, foundations, and some international agencies) to reduce agroecology to a purely technical intervention. Unless social or political elements are engaged, and the penetration of capitalist relations of production is weakened, the subordination of food systems to capital accumulation will persist, and so will environmental and social dysfunction.