PAEc en la 5th AESOP Sustainable Food Planning Conference

Daily news in Spain give a bleak outlook, with increasing amountsof undernourished children, entrenched high youth unemployment rates, social disenfranchisement and economic paralysis. Giving an answer to food needs based in the leveraging of local resources could contribute to unclog the other problems. Relying on local provision of foods and services goes against the prevailing principle that each territory should concentrate in its strengths,specializing in its areas of production expertise. This radical shift is justified by figures emanated from the research, which was focused on the peri-urban areas of medium-sized inland cities withan agrarian tradition and unfolded into three different steps

The 5th AESOP Sustainable Food Planning Conference took place in Montpellier, 28-29th October. Two intense days of debates and mutual lerning. As part of the PAEc dissemination work, we contributed to the Track LAND: FARMING FOR THE FUTURE with the paper » When food needs can not wait for bureaucratic plans: leveraging potentialsynergies in Spanish inner cities» by Marian Simon Rojo and Jose Antonio Garcia Roldan.

El resumen ampliado se puede consultar en la página 95 del Book of Abstracts edited by ARNALC & PERRIN, (UMRA Innovation, INRA), dispoinbel en https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/33661829/AESOP-book-of-abstracts1.pdf

1. Could the surrounding agrarian areas produce enough food to feed these cities?
2. How much of these agrarian areas are really connected to local provision of food? Which are the main constraints to develop efficient short food supply chain?
3. There is no clear strategy for achieving a sustainable food system, but there is a myriad of different initiatives from grass-root groups to local government projects. How could the different types of urban and periurban agriculture be integrated in food system plans?