19pgs, Advocates of indoor vertical farming have pitched the enterprise as key to the future of food, an opportunity to use technological innovation to increase local food production, bolster urban sustainability, and create a world in which there is “real food” for everyone. At the same time, critics have raised concerns about the costs, energy usage, social impacts, and overall agricultural viability of these efforts, with some insisting that existing low-tech and community-based solutions of the “good food movement” offer a better path forward. Drawing from a mix of participant observation and other qualitative methods, this article examines the work of Square Roots, a Brooklyn-based indoor vertical farming company cofounded by entrepreneur Kimbal Musk and technology CEO Tobias Peggs. In an effort to create a market for what I refer to as “techno-local food,” Square Roots pitches its products as simultaneously “real” and technologically optimized. As a way to build trust in these novel products and better connect consumers with producers, Square Roots leans on transparency as a publicity tool. The company’s Transparency Timeline, for instance, uses photos and a narrative account of a product’s life-cycle to tell its story “from seed-to-store,” allowing potential customers to “know their farmer.” The information Square Roots shares, however, offers a narrow peek into its operations, limiting the view of operational dynamics that could help determine whether the company is actually living up to its promise. The research provides a clear case study of an organization using transparency–publicity as market strategy, illustrating the positive possibilities that such an approach can bring to consumer engagement, while also demonstrating how the tactic can distract from a company’s stated social responsibility goals.
Authors examined the growth of meal kit delivery services. They advance three arguments to explore the cultural phenomenon of these services. "Despite their investment in the performative dimensons of cooking as a way to reconnect with the food system, they also miss opportunities to address gender, culture, and waste, which limits the radical potential of that performativity."
USA: Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 165 Document Number: D11666
Notes:
2 pages., Author examines implications of Amazon's acquisition of Whole Foods. Suggests possible consequences such as anti-trust charges of monopoly and impact on agricultural businesses and suppliers in the food chain. Also offers advice to reporters in covering this development.
11pgs, Taylor and Francis Online, The field of research on agricultural and rural extension and education, also referred to as advisory services and intermediaries, has always engaged with different aspects of the spaces in which agricultural producers (farmers, growers, ranchers) are situated and operate. In this editorial, I will reflect on the elements and environments which jointly constitute and shape the farm (Darnhofer 2020) and their connection with extension and advisory services in the digital age, opening up new digital and virtual spaces. Extension and advisory services receive ample consideration in current debates on digitalization and digital transformation of the agrifood sector, and are an important focus of attention for agriculture and food systems research, practice and policy (Ehlers, Huber, and Finger 2021; Ingram and Maye 2020; Klerkx 2020). In what follows, I will elaborate on some digital and virtual spaces as sites of extension and advisory services research, to progress the field of study for which The Journal of Agricultural Education and Extension serves as a publication outlet.
Online from publisher. 3 pages., Highlights and cited reactions to a 10-year plan, "New Era for Smarter Food Safety," from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Four key elements: tech-enabled traceability, smarter tools and approaches for prevention and outbreak response, new business models (such as e-commerce) and retail food modernization, and food safety culture.
3 pages, via online journal, The fast-moving coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic engulfed the world within four months from December to March of 2020, with long-lasting impacts on social, economic, political, educational, and scientific programs. It exacerbated risks of food and nutritional insecurity for a large segment of society, and threats of disruption in the food supply chain may be aggravated by climate change, soil degradation, and the flood/drought syndrome. Ensuring adequate access to nutritious food is a daunting challenge even in developed/scientifically advanced countries, and is a sheer tragedy in poor nations.
America’s rural-urban divide seemingly has never been greater, a point reinforced by large geographic disparities in support for Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election. But it is also the case that big cities and rural communities are more tightly integrated than ever and are increasingly interdependent, both economically and socially. This new rural-urban interface is highlighted in this collection of articles, which are organized and developed around the general concept of changing symbolic and social boundaries. Rural-urban boundaries—how rural and urban people and places are defined and evaluated—reflect and reinforce institutional forces that maintain spatial inequality and existing social, economic, and political hierarchies. This volume makes clear that rural-urban boundaries are highly fluid and that this should be better reflected in research programs, in the topics that we choose to study, and in the way that public policy is implemented.
Online via publisher website., This paper proposes a food safety traceability system based on the blockchain and the EPC Information Services and develops a prototype system.
