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This introduction provides an overview of the discourse on alternative agrifood movements (AAMs) to (1) ascertain the degree of convergence and divergence around a common ethos of alterity and (2) context the chapters of the book. AAMs have increased in recent years in response to the growing legitimation crisis of the conventional agrifood system. Some agrifood researchers argue that AAMs represent the vanguard movement of our time, a formidable counter movement to global capitalism. Other authors note a pattern of blunting of the transformative qualities of AAMs due to conventionalization and mainstreaming in the market. The literature on AAMs is organized following a Four Questions in Agrifood Studies (Constance, 2008) framework. The section for each Question ends with a case study to better illustrate the historical dynamics of an AAM. The literature review ends with a summary of the discourse applied to the research question of the book: Are AAMs the vanguard social movement of our time? The last section of this introduction provides a short description of each contributing chapter of the book, which is divided into five sections: Introduction; Theoretical and Conceptual Framings; Food Sovereignty Movements; Alternative Movements in the Global North; and Conclusions.

This chapter focusses on food systems' vulnerability. In a rapidly and unpredictably changing world, vulnerability of farming and food systems becomes a key issue. The conceptual bases for food vulnerability analysis and food vulnerability assessment are discussed in a systemic perspective with an eye to the transition approach (Geels, 2004) as a perspective capable to analyze how novelties can develop and influence the system capability to fulfil societal functions, and food and nutrition security in particular. A framework for assessing people's food vulnerability is presented together with a simple vulnerability model based on the three dimensions of exposure (the degree to which a system is likely to experience environmental or sociopolitical stress), sensitivity (the degree to which a system is modified or affected by perturbations) and adaptive capacity (the ability to evolve in order to accommodate environmental hazards or change) (Adger, 2006). Then, other sections are dedicated to discuss the general questions that should be answered by a vulnerability assessment exercise, and the specific challenges emerging when the assessment concerns a food system. These elements are then used in the Annex to this chapter as a base for the development of a detailed method based on seven distinct steps for conducting participatory assessments of the vulnerability of food systems.

Purpose – This chapter introduces the book collection and sets the theoretical framework for the subsequent chapters.

Design/methodology/approach – The approach of the book is to re-interpret major challenges to global agriculture – particularly climate change and the food crisis of 2008 – as demonstrating shocks to the resilience of global food systems.

Findings – Using resilience to shocks as a key quality of food systems enables recent crises to be understood as central to the ongoing dynamics of food systems rather than simply atypical events. Alongside climate change and food security, other potential shocks are identified: biosecurity, energy, financial and volcanic.

Originality/value – This framework establishes new criteria for examining the potential merit of multifunctional and neo-liberal policy regimes with world food systems.

In recent years the production and consumption of food have become both more transnational and diversified. Concurrent with these transformations has been the increasing use of standards to differentiate both agricultural products and processes. Historically standards were understood as “natural market lubricants,” but today they are increasingly viewed as tools for competitive advantage. As the use of standards has proliferated, the need to ensure compliance has also increased. Third-party certification (TPC) is one way to ensure compliance and it is becoming increasingly prominent in the global agrifood system. This chapter examines the complex effects that the widespread implementation of standards and TPC is having on the global agrifood system. What is occurring is not simple standardization and differentiation, but rather differentiated standardization and standardized differentiation. In the first instance, whereas we have standardization, it is differentiated, as multiple options remain. For example, while TPC for food safety and quality is becoming increasingly common, what such certification means continues to have considerable diversity. In the latter case, different kinds of agricultural practices are becoming standardized (i.e., organic). That is, difference (e.g., alternative agriculture) is becoming standardized, so that it is increasingly becoming the same globally. In concluding, we argue that standardization and differentiation are both taking place simultaneously in the global agrifood system, and that analyses of the globalization of food and agriculture must begin to recognize this.

Academic and popular literatures have addressed growing concerns about the ways we produce, harvest, distribute, and consume food; manage fisheries and inputs to agriculture; and deal with waste. Throughout the 20th century, a series of issue-specific frames emerged that explicitly addressed issues of social justice, the environment, and human health in the food system. During the mid-1990s that comprehensive master frames were established in attempts to bring disparate ideas and actions together into a more inclusive food movement. In this chapter, we explore the development of these collective action frames and turn to Canada as a case study to examine the key moments that have brought together diverse actors through collaborative networks to assert their place within a broader social movement. We argue that recognizing the increasing development of food networks and making these relationships visible opens new theoretical and practical possibilities for food system transformation.

Our global food system today is characterised by an unprecedented scale of centralisation, intensification and concentration. The record‐high food supplies are supposed to suffice the mouths of seven billion and famines become something in history, which is ironically not the case today. The purpose of this paper is to study whether the globalised food system in the current form is sustainable for all and whether the alternatives are available.

The paper will discuss the benefits of, as well as challenges facing, a localised food system. It will also analyse how the “Food Empire” undermines universal “food security” and “food sovereignty”, especially the way the underprivileged in the south are being exploited.

Created by several transnational corporations, the “Food Empire” dominates the global agri‐food industry, from agricultural inputs to food retails, under intensive globalisation of agri‐production and liberalisation of international trade. Instead of a globalised food system, this paper argues that it is better to have localised food systems as they can offer people an equitable access to food and ensure long‐term productivity of our farmlands as part of the agenda for sustainable development.

We have to review trade rules and stop the food war against nature, the poor and justice. “Free market” and “green revolution” in which many believe are not whole of the answers to achieve a sustainable food system, but only the “political will” to change the way food is produced and consumed from now on.

Improving the nutritious quality of diets for individuals and populations is a central goal of many public health advocates and intergovernmental organizations. Yet the outcome of healthy eating has been shown to systematically vary across individual-level socioeconomic lines, and across countries in different locations of the food system. We therefore assess variation in the association between eating nutritionally dense fresh fruits and vegetables and both self-rated health (SRH) and body mass index (BMI) across individual income and country locations in the food system.

We use nationally representative survey data from 31 countries drawn from the International Social Survey Programme’s 2011 Health module. We estimate the effect of the frequency of eating fresh fruits and vegetables using random-intercept, random-coefficient multilevel mixed-effects regression models.

We confirm that eating nutritionally dense fresh fruits and vegetables frequently associates with more positive health outcomes. However, this general conclusion masks substantial individual- and country-level heterogeneity. For both SRH and BMI, the largest beneficial associations are concentrated among the most affluent individuals in the most affluent countries. Moving away from either reduces the positive association of healthy eating.

Our results provide an important wrinkle for policies aimed at changing the nutritional quality of diets. Adjustments to diets without taking into account fundamental causes of socioeconomic status will likely be met with attenuated results.

We compare two important health outcomes across a wide variety of types of countries. We demonstrate that our main conclusions are only detectable when employing a flexible multilevel methodological design.

To analyze more deeply and in a systemic perspective food system outcomes, and the contribution that small farming can give to the achievement of those outcomes, a detailed analysis of food systems is required, which highlights its components, activities and dynamics. Thus, this chapter deepens the analysis of the food system. We first reflect on the complexity of the concept of food system, discussing the abundance of different conceptualizations proposed in the scientific and political debate on the base of different disciplines and perspectives. Then, a comprehensive representation is shown, which is then unpacked. The food system actors, assets and functions are explored, with an eye on power relations among actors and on the main drivers of change. Governance (that also includes actors external to the food systems) is called ‘reflexive’, as long as it characterizes a system that is able to reflect upon the conditions and the forms of its own functioning, to detect and analyze threats and to change accordingly, with the involvement of actors external to the food systems. This analysis, which represents the focus of this section, provides the base for the description of the food system vulnerability developed in Chapter 4. Drivers of change and governance emerge as key categories to consider.

Data on the food system's impact on environment, society and health point to a policy mismatch between current food consumption trends and long term viability. The role of public policy in this state of affairs requires critical attention. Public policy is generally weak and still dominated by a fixation on productionism and failing to integrate equally pressing concerns. Instead the facilitating power and responsibilities of the state are too often side-stepped. A new public policy approach is required that addresses the multi-criteria nature of how we assess contemporary food systems and their challenges. The role of the state is key to any transformation but states have been weak to support the creation of better infrastructure that would normalise what society and ecosystems really need namely sustainable diets from sustainable food systems. A genuinely systemic policy approach is required for urban populations, one which gives equal emphasis to all sector of food supply chains, not just primary production. The chapter explores ideological and practical logjams which hinder the pursuit of twenty-first-century progress. These include a reluctance to confront limitations in mainstream economics and uncritical acceptance of consumer power. Only the state has the potential legitimacy to facilitate a food system transformation and to provide the foundational economy which would normalise low impact living and eating.

The novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) variant of 2019 has taken more than 3.8 million lives according to the World Health Organization. To stop the spread of such a deadly and contagious disease, lockdown of varying nature was imposed worldwide. Lockdown, preventive techniques and observation of standard operating procedures (SOPs) have effectively decreased the spread of contagious diseases but have affected various businesses and industries economically. The food industry has been hit hard by different restriction parameters, due to which a disruption in food supply and demand was observed. Therefore, this study aims to study this disruption in the supply chain of processed food.

A comprehensive review was conducted on PubMed, Google Scholar, and Scopus to locate articles on processed foods, food delivery and supply chain. The selected articles were evaluated using the context analysis method.

The pandemic situation has increased the consumption and demand for processed food products from retail stores, and decreased the demand for food service products. These circumstances called for technological advancement in the field of food supply from farm to fork. This study reviews research articles, policies and secondary literature. Several advances have been made to deliver safe, nutritious and wholesome food to consumers. Block chain-based food supply chains, value stream mapping, sustainable supply chain domain and online ordering systems via mobile apps have been discussed in correspondence with information and communication technology (ICT) during COVID-19.

This study concludes that the use of advanced software and its adequate knowledge by suppliers, logistics companies and consumers have assisted in handling shocks to the global food system and provided in-time food delivery, traceability, database information and securely processed food to consumers.

This study shows the effects of COVID-19 pandemic on global food systems; disruption in food demand and supply chain is overlooked and changed; use of technological advances in food supply chain to tackle pandemic; online food ordering system gained popularity and improved technically.

1. The review highlights the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on global food systems.

2. The disruption in food demand and supply chain is overlooked and changed.

3. The use of technological advances in the food supply chain to tackle the pandemic.

4. The online food ordering system gained popularity and improved technically.

The review highlights the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on global food systems.

The disruption in food demand and supply chain is overlooked and changed.

The use of technological advances in the food supply chain to tackle the pandemic.

The online food ordering system gained popularity and improved technically.