by tight social relations based on familiarity, habit, and sentiment between farmers
and consumers, and these relations remain at the commodity level alone.
Community-supported agriculture, on the other hand, is based on shared partnership
and agreement among local farmers and consumers to share costs, risks, and
products. Groh and McFadden (1998) indicates that the main difference between
community-supported agriculture and other types of direct markets is that
community-supported agriculture focuses on making community-related food,
land, and nature. White and Stirling (2013) indicate that community-supported
agriculture is “a critical arena for exploring trajectories towards Sustainability.”
There are some barriers for farmers and producers of local food to satisfy the
demand from all consumers. Martinez (2010) explained that the producers of local
food will not always manage to do so, either due to limited capacity or due to
demand for food that is unavailable or out of season, high demand for specific
products, or the fact that delivery is time-consuming. One another barrier is a lack of
proper distribution infrastructure (Shipman 2009). In fact the farmers and food
producer do not access the supply chain infrastructure, like vehicles or
temperature-controlled storage facilities (Martinez 2010). Because, economically
speaking, it make more sense for local farmers to combine their products and
foods with the products of other local farmers at the processing and shipping
stage, it is difficult to have a traceback mechanism in place (Martinez 2010).
However, product traceability is very important to buyers, because it provides
them with information about the origin of products and the risk of food-related
illnesses (Shipman 2009). The final barrier for local farmers is their limited expertise
and training concerning important and relevant topics like risk management, food
safety liability, and good agricultural practices. Training in these areas is of special
importance in terms of the potential success, especially for young farmers (Shipman
2009).
4.4 Waste Management
A number of countries in the world now focus on reducing the amount of food being
wasted. Since 2011, that has also been the aim of a number of European Institutions
(EP 2011). In the following section, we list some of solutions and regulations that
can be used to reduce food waste at different stages of agri-food systems:
– Providing enough information and incentives helps retailers predict the amounts
of food they need to order from producers and wholesalers (Nordic Council of
Ministers 2011).
– The use of a “just-in-time” approach by primary agricultural producers, especially
for products like milk and fruits, which need to be fresh and delivered in time.
This method provides greater certainty when it comes to ordering the right
amount of products (Halloran et al. 2014).
66
N. Salimi
and consumers, and these relations remain at the commodity level alone.
Community-supported agriculture, on the other hand, is based on shared partnership
and agreement among local farmers and consumers to share costs, risks, and
products. Groh and McFadden (1998) indicates that the main difference between
community-supported agriculture and other types of direct markets is that
community-supported agriculture focuses on making community-related food,
land, and nature. White and Stirling (2013) indicate that community-supported
agriculture is “a critical arena for exploring trajectories towards Sustainability.”
There are some barriers for farmers and producers of local food to satisfy the
demand from all consumers. Martinez (2010) explained that the producers of local
food will not always manage to do so, either due to limited capacity or due to
demand for food that is unavailable or out of season, high demand for specific
products, or the fact that delivery is time-consuming. One another barrier is a lack of
proper distribution infrastructure (Shipman 2009). In fact the farmers and food
producer do not access the supply chain infrastructure, like vehicles or
temperature-controlled storage facilities (Martinez 2010). Because, economically
speaking, it make more sense for local farmers to combine their products and
foods with the products of other local farmers at the processing and shipping
stage, it is difficult to have a traceback mechanism in place (Martinez 2010).
However, product traceability is very important to buyers, because it provides
them with information about the origin of products and the risk of food-related
illnesses (Shipman 2009). The final barrier for local farmers is their limited expertise
and training concerning important and relevant topics like risk management, food
safety liability, and good agricultural practices. Training in these areas is of special
importance in terms of the potential success, especially for young farmers (Shipman
2009).
4.4 Waste Management
A number of countries in the world now focus on reducing the amount of food being
wasted. Since 2011, that has also been the aim of a number of European Institutions
(EP 2011). In the following section, we list some of solutions and regulations that
can be used to reduce food waste at different stages of agri-food systems:
– Providing enough information and incentives helps retailers predict the amounts
of food they need to order from producers and wholesalers (Nordic Council of
Ministers 2011).
– The use of a “just-in-time” approach by primary agricultural producers, especially
for products like milk and fruits, which need to be fresh and delivered in time.
This method provides greater certainty when it comes to ordering the right
amount of products (Halloran et al. 2014).
66
N. Salimi