In January 2020, the team took a break from their respective field sites and travelled back to Leiden to take stock of their research progress and to host its third Advisory Board meeting at their home institution, the Institute of Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology of Leiden University.
On August 27 – 31 I participated to the IUAES 2019 Inter- congress in Poznan, Poland entitled "World Solidarities". It was a great experience to learn more about various approaches to the study of solidarity in very different contexts. As the theme of solidarity is a key dimension of the ‘Food Citizens?’ research project, I would like to share some of the insights from presentations I have attended and found particularly relevant to the project.
In late May 2019, the Food citizens? team traveled to Poland for a project meeting and team outing. This was made possible by the European Research Council’s support and facilitated networks and knowledge-generation.
Rotterdam is one of the cities participating to the Edible Cities Network (EdiCitiNet), an international cooperation of municipalities that aim to increase the ‘edibility’ of urban spaces. In this blog, Vincent will describe his experiences at one of their recent workshops.
On the first weekend of June a plot of land in Lutkemeerpolder, West Amsterdam, was occupied in order to host the Food Autonomy Festival. The event was organized in solidarity with local farms to protest against the development of Schiphol airport-oriented business park. Two of our PhD's, Maria Vasile and Ola Gracjasz, joined the protest.
On February 21st, Maria Vasile, one of the PhD students of the project participated to several events organized in Milan by the University of Milano-Bicocca for the celebration of the World Anthropology Day.
How can we organize the food system in the Amsterdam Metropolitan Region in a more sustainable and democratic way? This is the overarching theme of the activities of the Food Council Metropolitan Region Amsterdam. On Friday the 15th of March 2019 they invited Prof. Cristina Grasseni to give a presentation on her work on the networks of Solidarity Purchase Groups in northern Italy, known as Gruppi di Acquisto Solidale, and think along with members of the Food Council about possibilities for growing the solidarity economy in the Dutch context.
Robin Smith, post-doc of the 'Food Citizens?'-project wrote an interesting blog for the Leiden Anthropology blog on the basis of her previous fieldwork on the role of trust in the wine industry in Istria.
On December 1st, Maria Vasile attended the annual meeting of Wallonia’s Mouvement d’Action Paysanne (MAP) (Peasant Action Movement). The members of the MAP gather on this particular day to celebrate St. Eloi, who is recognized as the saint patron of farmers and of the working class, more generally. This is an occasion for MAP farmers to get together, share impressions and discuss about the achievements, challenges and ways forward for the movement. In this article she will share her experience.
The Food Citizens? team has contributed in the special issue of the ICA journal. The semi-scientific journal of the study association Itiwana of Leiden University's Institute of Cultural Anthropology.
