Description
Book SynopsisThis visionary book takes stock of the urgent challenges facing food chains globally and provides a critical evaluation of radical new thinking and perspectives on agricultural and food policy. Wyn Grant investigates the principal drivers of change in food and agriculture, including globalization, climate change, the structure of the industry, changing patterns of consumer demand and new technologies.
Rethinking Agricultural and Food Policy provides a comprehensive account of the contemporary challenges impacting the food chain. Chapters explore the various barriers towards positive progress, exposing the deficiency of institutional architecture at a domestic and international level and examining how attempts to reform and revitalize it encounter inertia, embedded production structures, defenders of the status quo and vested interests. Proposing that a holistic, interdisciplinary approach is essential in making progress towards revitalizing policy and encouraging innovation in international governance, Wyn Grant calls for a new agenda to deliver real and necessary change and offer hope for the planet and its people.
Using critical insights from natural and social science to uphold its calls for a holistic, integrated approach to agricultural and food policy, this timely book will be an essential read for policy makers, as well as students taking undergraduate or postgraduate courses in agriculture, food and the environment.
Trade Review‘Food – what we eat and how it is produced – has become a hot button issue. In this book, Wyn Grant draws on his deep knowledge and experience of agricultural and food policies to provide an up-to-date and accessible introduction to the policies and politics of food. This book enriches the contemporary debate on transforming our food system by systematically outlining the challenges it faces and exploring the changes that are required.’ -- Alan Matthews, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland
Table of ContentsContents: Preface 1. Introduction: what needs to be rethought? 2. How food reaches the plate: the structure of the food chain 3. Consumer demand and producer responses 4. Globalization 5. The role of the state 6. Plant and animal health and welfare 7. Climate change 8. Conclusions: selecting priorities References Index
