Si scrive cibo (agroecologico e territorializzato), si legge democrazia (di luogo)

Abstract

This essay offers an analysis of the global situation of food systems, providing a few pointers concerning two interconnected issues: the democratisation of the access to food, and the need to heal the ecological damage caused by centralized and mass systems for production and consumption of merchandise. We approach such phenomena through a multi-scalar prism, interpreting the geographical articulation of social behaviour through a continuous shift from local to global. We focus on the processes of modernization and development of commodity-food that, since last century, took hold in many regions, along with their social and ecological failures. Subsequently, various alternative paths of production, distribution and consumption of food are studied, trying to match the nutritional daily needs of local citizens but also the ecological features of their territories and of the life-supporting systems of our planet. You write food and you read democracy as our most urgent challenge is to recover the capacity to reconcile human and ecological communities. This can only be achieved by renouncing centralized and hierarchical (and anti-democratic by nature) models of commodity management. Ultimately, the most effective ‘therapies’ to heal the current crisis of social and political systems are nestled in those agro-ecological, small-scale farming practices that, by cooling climate, can restore the independence of local communities and their dwellers.