Dear Colleagues and fellow food system researchers,
We are pleased to invite you to a special session titled «S49 The impact of COVID-19 on alternative and local food systems (ALFS) and the potential for sustainability transitions – case studies and theoretical considerations» to be held at the 60th ERSA Congress in Bolzano, Italy (24-27 August 2021).
Session organizers:
Chiffoleau Yuna; Institut National de la Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement (INRAE), France
Nemes Gusztáv; Centre for Economic and Regional Studies (KRTK), Hungary
Zollet Simona; Hiroshima University, Japan
We invite presentations for this special session discussing how alternative and local food systems (ALFS) responded during the first year of the Covid-19 crisis and what are the consequences for territorial development, resilience and sustainability.
Through this special session, we aim to explore:
1) the innovations and adaptations implemented within ALFS in different territorial economic and cultural contexts;
2) how these innovations and adaptations are creating or supporting a transition in food production and consumption systems;
3) how the combination of social and technological innovation, greater citizen involvement, and the increase in the interest of policy-makers and large retailers in these systems are enabling ALFS to scale up and leading new actors to adopt more sustainable practices.
We welcome both case studies (comparative or dealing with individual countries, regions, localities, sectors, businesses, etc.) and more theoretical papers, perceiving the COVID-19 crisis as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see how different systems embedded in different local contexts reacted to the same challenges and using it to broaden and deepen the theoretical and analytical frameworks for the analysis of ALFS.
As a further outcome of this Special Session, we also aim to collect outstanding contributions from food system researchers and organise a special issue discussing the topics outlined above. The session will be followed by a workshop where the presenters and the organizers will establish the basis for the special issue.
The call for presentations is available at this link:
Important dates:
February 15, 2021 Call for abstracts (and papers) Open -
March 9, 2021 Deadline for abstract (and paper) submission
April 22, 2021 Notification of acceptance and registration start
Congress website: https://ersa.eventsair.com/60th-ersa-congress-bolzano-italy/
Feel free to share this call widely with other researchers who might be interested in the topic, and for any question about the session, please contact one of the organizers:
Chiffoleau Yuna (yuna.chiffoleau@inrae.fr )
Nemes Gusztáv (nemes23@gmail.com)
Zollet Simona (simona.zollet@gmail.com )