Hannah Wittman

University of British Columbia - Vancouver | UBC · Faculty of Land and Food Systems

Food sovereignty movements emerged in the 1990s as a global constellation of struggles against the corporate food regime. Here, we propose a radically relational ‘sites, stakes, and scales' framework for analyzing food sovereignty mobilization, adopting a flat ontology that considers both actual and potential relations. ‘Sites' refer to the actuall...

Effective governance of agricultural systems is needed for achieving goals of food security, resilient food systems, and addressing the impacts of climate change. Local governments have an increasing interest in the role of agriculture in meeting these goals. However, alignment varies greatly between local governing systems and agricultural systems...

Young people are on the front lines of transforming agriculture and food systems, coping with the social and economic impacts of COVID-19 as well as environmental and climate change effects which are likely to accelerate and intensify during their lifetimes. At the same time, young people across global contexts are increasingly emerging as visible...

Despite the organic movement’s early connections to labour advocacy and commitment to the principle of “Fairness”, the evolution of the organic sector has generated questions about the strength of its links to food justice in certified organic farming. Scholar-activists have, in particular, highlighted the problematic nature of labour relations on...

Extreme events, such as those caused by climate change, economic or geopolitical shocks, and pest or disease epidemics, threaten global food security. The complexity of causation, as well as the myriad ways that an event, or a sequence of events, creates cascading and systemic impacts, poses significant challenges to food systems research and polic...

Agroecological transitions aim to redesign the structure of contemporary global food systems to improve food security, ecosystem health, community development, worker livelihoods, and social and ecological justice. A fundamental principle of agroecology is the responsible governance of land. Yet land—as a concept, resource, and territory—is heavily...

Enhancing climate resilience in agrarian communities requires improving the underlying socioecological conditions for farmers to engage in adaptation and mitigation strategies, alongside collaborative and redistributive community development to reduce vulnerabilities. To overcome barriers to climate resilience in the Philippines, a grassroots farme...

Gender equity is recognized as central to sustainable development, but women still face significant constraints in accessing and controlling productive resources important for agricultural livelihoods. Identifying mechanisms (e.g., policies and interventions) in agriculture that enhance women's empowerment-a critical aspect of gender equity-is of p...

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.2196/30899.].

BACKGROUND Good nutrition affects children’s health, well-being, and learning, and schools offer an important setting to promote healthy behaviors that can last a lifetime. Once children reach school age, they spend more of their waking hours in school than in any other environment. Children’s eating habits may be easier to influence than those of...

This systematic review assembles evidence for rights-based approaches–the right to food and food sovereignty–for achieving food security and adequate nutrition (FSN). We evaluated peer-reviewed and gray literature produced between 1992 and 2018 that documents empirical relationships between the right to food or food sovereignty and FSN. We classifi...

UNSTRUCTURED Good nutrition impacts children’s health, wellbeing and learning, and schools offer an important setting to promote healthy behaviors that can last a lifetime. Once children reach school age, they spend more of their waking hours in school than in any other environment. Children’s eating habits may be easier to influence than those of...

Background Good nutrition affects children’s health, well-being, and learning, and schools offer an important setting to promote healthy behaviors that can last a lifetime. Once children reach school age, they spend more of their waking hours in school than in any other environment. Children’s eating habits may be easier to influence than those of...

Small farms constitute most of the world’s farms and are a central focus of sustainable agricultural development. However, the relationship between farm size and production, profitability, biodiversity and greenhouse gas emissions remains contested. Here, we synthesize current knowledge through an evidence review and meta-analysis and show that sma...

Management of crop diversity for improved agroecosystem functioning can provide economic co-benefits to farmers. Yet, there remain critical gaps in understanding how farm management practices evolve through agroecological transitions and how agroecological practices affect socioeconomic outcomes such as income and working conditions. We conducted a...

The COVID-19 pandemic has claimed hundreds of thousands of lives and cost economies trillions of dollars. Yet state responses have done little to address the negative externalities of the corporate food regime, which has contributed to, and exacerbated, the impacts of the pandemic. In this paper, we build on calls from the grassroots for states to...

Big data and mobile technology are widely claimed to be global disruptive forces in agriculture that benefit small-scale farmers. Yet the access of small-scale farmers to this technology is poorly understood. We show that only 24–37% of farms of <1 ha in size are served by third generation (3G) or 4G services, compared to 74–80% of farms of >200 ha...

Diversified farming systems have received considerable attention for their potential to contribute to environmentally sustainable and resilient food systems. This chapter discusses the potential of public procurement programmes in building public support for diversified farming systems. Focusing on Brazil’s flagship public procurement programme...

Agroecology, as a science, practice, and social movement, has been posed as a potential pathway to revitalize global food systems through a shift towards social and ecological justice. Complex and diversified agroecological systems vary widely globally and have been poorly characterized by traditional agronomic assessments that often focus narrowly...

This paper furthers the development of the theory of agrarian citizenship–the bundle of rights and responsibilities underpinning the food sovereignty movement. Through interviews with 34 participants engaged with urban agriculture in Metro Vancouver, Canada, we introduce the concept of urban agrarianism, defined as an urban ethic of care for foodla...

The COVID-19 pandemic has focused renewed public attention on the risks and harms generated by a globalized, industrialized, and corporatized food system. This crisis reinvigorates the need for a research agenda that identifies compelling ways of holding key actors in the corporate food regime accountable for creating and profiting from systemic ri...

Non-technical summary Until the past half-century, all agriculture and land management was framed by local institutions strong in social capital. But neoliberal forms of development came to undermine existing structures, thus reducing sustainability and equity. The past 20 years, though, have seen the deliberate establishment of more than 8 million...

Objective To further understandings of household food insecurity in First Nations communities in Canada and its relationship with obesity. Design Analysis of a cross-sectional dataset from the First Nations Food, Nutrition and Environment Study representative of First Nations communities south of the 60th parallel. Multivariate logistic regression...

Objective To identify key school-level contexts and mechanisms associated with implementing a provincial school food and beverage policy. Design Realist evaluation. Data collection included semi-structured interviews ( n 23), structured questionnaires ( n 62), participant observation at public events ( n 3) and scans of school, school district and...

Financial incentives are increasingly popular in development and conservation. A common application involves paying for conservation activities, such as for farmers to set aside land for forests, known as payments for ecosystem services (PES). Debates about incentives such as PES center around the promise and perils of applying market logics to con...

Energy projects may profoundly impact Indigenous peoples. We consider effects of Canada’s proposed Trans Mountain oil pipeline expansion on the health and food sovereignty of the Tsleil-Waututh Nation (TWN) through contamination and impeded access to uncontaminated traditional foods. Federal monitoring and TWN documentation show elevated shellfish...

Diversified farms have received considerable attention for their potential to contribute to environmentally sustainable, resilient, and socially just food systems. In response, some governments are building new forms of public support for social-ecological services through the creation of mediated markets, such as targeted public food procurement p...

Intervention British Columbia’s (BC) provincial school food and beverage sales policy. Research question What are the processes associated with district-level implementation of BC’s school food and beverage sales policy? Methods We adopted a realist approach and a qualitative, multiple case study design that included three urban and two rural BC...

Sustainably feeding the next generation is often described as one of the most pressing "grand challenges" facing the 21 st century. Generally, scholars propose addressing this problem by increasing agricultural production, investing in technology to boost yields, changing diets, or reducing food waste. In this paper, we explore whether global food...

Canada is one of the only member countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) without a national school food program. Good nutrition impacts children’s health, wellbeing, and learning; and school food environments offer an important setting to promote health and other food system sustainability behaviours that can l...

This article surveys the current state of agroecology in Canada, giving particular attention to agroecological practices, the related social movements, and the achievements of agroecological science. In each of these realms, we find that agroecology emerges as a response to the various social and ecological problems associated with the prevailing i...

This article explores the development of municipal policy and planning processes related to urban agriculture, and more specifically to urban farming in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. We examine the extent to which Vancouver's food and sustainability-related policies align with the commitments of the Milan Urban Food Policy Pact, a set of com...

School food environments are the target of nutrition interventions and evaluations across the globe. Yet little work to-date has articulated the importance of developing a theory of change upon which to base evaluation of both implementation and outcomes. This paper undertakes an interpretive approach to develop a retrospective theory of change for...

Farm to school programs have been positioned as interventions that can support goals of the global food sovereignty movement, including strengthening local food production systems, improving food access and food justice for urban populations, and reducing distancing between producers and consumers. However, there has been little assessment of how a...

North American food bank use has risen dramatically since the 1980s, and over 850,000 Canadians were estimated to have visited a food bank monthly in 2015. Food banks serve multiple roles in communities, ranging from 'emergency responses' to individualized and short-term experiences of hunger, to 'chronic' supports as part of long-term subsistence...

Climate change poses serious threats to agriculture. As a primary staple crop and major contributor to agriculturally derived greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, rice systems are of particular significance to building climate resilience. We report on a participatory assessment of climate resilience in organic and conventional rice systems located in fo...

Agroecology, as a social movement and scientific discipline, applies ecological principles to the design and management of agricultural systems to improve environmental outcomes and livelihoods for farmers and rural communities. However, little research to date has assessed the policy mechanisms that could facilitate increased adoption of agroecolo...

The major challenges of improving food security and biodiversity conservation are intricately linked. To date, the intersection of food security and biodiversity conservation has been viewed primarily through an agricultural ?production lens??for example, via the land sparing/sharing framework, or the concept of sustainable intensification. However...

As land and wealth are increasingly concentrated in North America, grassroots organizations are calling into question longstanding norms about the relationships between private property, sustainable agriculture, land governance institutions, and ongoing processes of agrarian transformation. In response to challenges faced by new entrants to agricul...

Concerns are growing over the ability of the modern food system to simultaneously achieve food security and environmental sustainability in the face of global change. Yet, the dominant tendency within university settings to conceptualize and address diverse food system challenges as separate, disconnected issues is a key barrier to food system tran...

Resumo Climate change and variability are among the main threats to socio-ecological sustainability in many semi-arid regions of the world and are of special concern to resource-poor family farmers. In the Brazilian semi-arid region, high levels of social vulnerability in addition to predicted climate events can adversely affect subsistence crops...

Citizens' concerns about farm animal welfare are often dismissed on the assumption that they are not well informed about farming practices. We conducted exploratory surveys of interested citizens (n = 50) before and after a self-guided tour of a 500-head dairy farm. 'Before' survey questions explored perceptions, concerns, and values about dairy ca...

Alternative food networks face both challenges and opportunities in rethinking the role of precarious employment in food system transformation. We explore how alternative food networks in British Columbia, Canada have engaged with flexible and precarious work regimes for farmworkers, including both temporary migrant workers and un(der)paid agricult...

While experts agree that poverty, population, energy prices, climate change, and socio-political dynamics undermine global food security, there is no agreement on effective strategies to meet this challenge. For example, some promote "high tech" solutions (e.g. biotechnology) designed to boost yield while others prefer local food systems. To better...

There has been growing policy interest in social justice issues related to both health and food. We sought to understand the state of knowledge on relationships between health equity-i.e. health inequalities that are socially produced-and food systems, where the concepts of 'food security' and 'food sovereignty' are prominent. We undertook explorat...

The food crisis of 2007–08 generated widespread global concerns about land consolidation and agricultural transition, with renewed attention on foreign land investments and growing global markets for meat and biofuels. As part of and alongside this process, agriculture and land-use projects registered in the Kyoto Protocol's Clean Development Mecha...

The global discourse on food sovereignty suggests several mechanisms for improving food security and agricultural livelihoods, including redistributive land reform and restructuring of markets to improve food distribution and access. In Brazil, the Fome Zero (Zero Hunger) social welfare programme has created innovative links between public nutritio...

In response to the failure of current approaches to alleviate the linked challenges of global food insecurity and environmental degradation—many of which involve voluntary measures to improve agricultural efficiency and increase yield—grassroots actors have called for the re-regulation and state-based institutionalization of principles derived from...

This study assessed the socioecological resilience of family farms in three land reform settlements in Mato Grosso, Brazil, located in the ecologically threatened Cerrado biome. Using focus groups, a household survey, and analysis of soil samples we characterized farming systems and quantified indicators of resilience, which we contextualized with...

2014 was the United Nations' International Year of Family Farming, yet the importance of family farming for global food security is still surprisingly poorly documented. In a review of agricultural census data, we find that globally family farms constitute over 98% of all farms, and work on 53% of agricultural land. Across distinct contexts, family...

Citizen engagement on issues around farm animal welfare (FAW) is important for the livestock industries to sustain their social license to produce. One barrier to this engagement is that non-farming citizens are sometimes perceived as ignorant of farming practices and their views are dismissed. Despite recent interest in understanding citizen views...

Post World War II suburban growth in Canada and the US has created concern over the long-term availability of farmland to meet food production needs. Subsequent efforts to provide legal protection to agricultural land continue to shape the development of the fringes of nearby urban areas. This paper employs the concept of “agriburbia,” suburban lan...

Scholarship related to environmental questions in Latin America has only recently begun to coalesce around citizenship as both an empirical site of inquiry and an analytical frame of reference. This has led to a series of new insights and perspectives, but few efforts have been made to bring these various approaches into a sustained conversation ac...

This paper examines how the concept and framework of food sovereignty has been incorporated in food policy agendas across diverse sectors of Canadian society, particularly in the work and discourse of the National Farmers Union, Québec's Union Paysanne, Food Secure Canada and movements for Indigenous food sovereignty. This analysis highlights both...

Strong feedback between global biodiversity loss and persistent, extreme rural poverty are major challenges in the face of concurrent food, energy, and environmental crises. This paper examines the role of industrial agricultural intensification and market integration as exogenous socio-ecological drivers of biodiversity loss and poverty traps in L...

Strong feedback between global biodiversity loss and persistent, extreme rural poverty are major challenges in the face of concurrent food, energy, and environmental crises. This paper examines the role of industrial agricultural intensification and market integration as exogenous socio-ecological drivers of biodiversity loss and poverty traps in L...

Farmers’ markets, often structured as non-profit or cooperative organizations, play a prominent role in emerging alternative food networks of western Canada. The contribution of these social economy organizations to network development may relate, in part, to the process of regional clustering. In this study we explore the nature and significance o...

The development and diversification of short food supply chains is a primary characteristic of burgeoning alternative food networks and systems in North America. This paper examines several grain production initiatives in southwest British Columbia that respond to the commodification and concentration of conventional, globalized grain production by...

The development and diversitlcation of short food supply chains is a primary characteristic of burgeoning alternative food networks and systems in North America. This paper examines several grain production initialises in southwest British Columbia that respond to the comniodilication and concentration of com entionai, globalized grain production b...

Often organized as grassroots, nonprofit organizations, many farmers' markets serve as strategic venues linking producers and consumers of local food while fulfilling multiple social, economic, and environmental objectives. This article examines the potential of farmers' markets to play a catalyst role in linking local food systems to the social ec...

This article explores how food system localisation efforts in Metro Vancouver, Canada, intersect with tensions in the global agri-food system, including racial inequalities. Drawing on archival research, participant observation of local food marketing and policy-making, and interviews with local food movement participants, policy-makers, and Chines...

Food sovereignty, as a critical alternative to the concept of food security, is broadly defined as the right of local peoples to control their own food systems, including markets, ecological resources, food cultures, and production modes. This article reviews the origins of the concept of food sovereignty and its theoretical and methodological deve...

People are taking back control of their food systems in the midst of economic and environmental crises. Food sovereignty, as a framework, evolved from the experience of farmers who were most immediately affected by changes in national and international agricultural policy introduced throughout the 1980s and early 1990s. Food sovereignty is broadly...

Food sovereignty offers Canadian citizens, researchers and policy makers the opportunity to build alternative agriculture and food models that are ecologically sustainable and socially just and that keep farmers on the land while ensuring that those living in cities have access to healthy and safe food. Using case studies of practical action, this...

Can post-occupancy assessment assess drivers of household consumption? A mixed-methods approach was used to investigate household consumption patterns in three housing types in Vancouver, Canada. An analysis of eight multi-unit, residential household settings was conducted that included high-performance green residential buildings, co-housing build...

Background/Question/Methods With the failure of Copenhagen to produce a binding treaty to reduce global carbon emissions, market solutions based on the trade of carbon emissions credits (known as Certified Emission Reductions (CERs)) remain the dominant frame of reference for international negotiations to address the drivers of climate change. Li...

The role of ecological land reform in fostering ecological citizenship and community environmental-resource-management in Brazil is examined through a case study of settlement practices of Brazil's Landless Workers' Movement between 2000 and 2005. The case study explores the opportunities that ecologically oriented land reform may provide for the e...

As a reflection of the ecological pressures associated with rapid modernization and globalization, the environment has become an enduring theme of public debate and protest in Latin America. Over the past decade, scholars have made increasing connections between such debate and a range of questions related to citizenship. Meanwhile, a discourse of...

Around the world people are resisting the environmental, social and political destruction perpetuated by the industrial agricultural system. This resistance has led to a new and radical agricultural practice amongst peasant and farmer organizations: food sovereignty. Food sovereignty aims to provide for the food needs of all people while respecting...

Amidst increasing concerns about climate change, food shortages, and widespread environmental degradation, a demand is emerging for ways to resolve longstanding social and ecological contradictions present in contemporary capitalist models of production and social organisation. This paper first discusses how agriculture, as the most intensive histo...

The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) of the Kyoto Protocol is designed to reduce global CO2 emissions while transferring technology and investment to developing countries. Little evaluation has been conducted, however, regarding the efficiency of outcomes and co-benefits or the social costs generated by carbon-mitigation projects. This article pre...