Alternative (Shorter) Food Supply Chains and Specialist Livestock Products in the Scottish–English Borders

In this paper findings are presented from survey work conducted with producers of specialist livestock products in the Scottish–English borders. Using supply-chain diagrams, the paper highlights how specialist livestock businesses operate individual or customised supply chains. The heterogeneity of surveyed producer initiatives throws into question both the simple conceptual distinction drawn between the labels ‘conventional’ and ‘alternative’ and also what is meant by a ‘short’ food supply chain. The starting point of the specialist food chain is clearly not the point of production but rather a series of upstream supply links—as is found in conventional food chains. Likewise, ‘alternative’ producers are regularly obliged, or choose, to ‘dip in and out’ of different conventional nodes downstream of the business, such as abattoirs, processors, and wholesalers. In practice, delimitations between ‘alternative’ and ‘conventional’ food supply chains are often blurred and are better characterised as ‘hybrid spaces’.

[1]  Angela Tregear,et al.  In search of the concerned consumer: UK public perceptions of food, farming and buying local , 2003 .

[2]  Adrian Smith.  Regions, Spaces of Economic Practice and Diverse Economies in the ‘New Europe’ , 2004 .

[3]  B. Mansfield.  Fish, factory trawlers, and imitation crab: the nature of quality in the seafood industry , 2003 .

[4]  Alan Scott,et al.  NOVEL FOOD, NEW MARKETS AND TRUST REGIMES: Responses to the erosion of consumers' confidence in Austria, Italy and the UK , 2001 .

[5]  S. Whatmore,et al.  What's Alternative about Alternative Food Networks? , 2003 .

[6]  T. Lang.  The complexities of globalization: The UK as a case study of tensions within the food system and the challenge to food policy , 1999 .

[7]  Laura T. Raynolds.  Re-embedding global agriculture: The international organic and fair trade movements , 2000 .

[8]  Moya Kneafsey,et al.  Forecasting Food Supply Chain Developments in Lagging Rural Regions: Evidence from the UK. , 2004 .

[9]  B. Ilbery,et al.  Making reconnections in agro-food geography: alternative systems of food provision , 2005 .

[10]  C. Hines.  Localization: A Global Manifesto , 2000 .

[11]  Moya Kneafsey,et al.  Reading the space of the farmers' market: a preliminary investigation from the UK. , 2000 .

[12]  M. Winter.  Embeddedness, the new food economy and defensive localism , 2003 .

[13]  Terry Marsden,et al.  The Social Management of Rural Nature: Understanding Agrarian-Based Rural Development , 2002 .

[14]  Patricia Allen,et al.  Shifting plates in the agrifood landscape: the tectonics of alternative agrifood initiatives in California , 2003 .

[15]  Tim P. Vos.  Visions of the middle landscape: Organic farming and the politics of nature , 2000 .

[16]  J. Murdoch,et al.  Spatializing Quality: Regional Protection and the Alternative Geography of Food , 2002 .

[17]  Moya Kneafsey,et al.  Product and Place , 1998 .

[18]  C. Sage,et al.  Social embeddedness and relations of regard , 2003 .

[19]  Developing quality in agro‐food supply chains: A Welsh perspective , 1999 .

[20]  D. Goodman.  The quality ‘turn’ and alternative food practices: reflections and agenda , 2003 .

[21]  T. Marsden,et al.  Understanding Alternative Food Networks: Exploring the Role of Short Food Supply Chains in Rural Development , 2003 .

[22]  Damian Maye,et al.  Food supply chains and sustainability: evidence from specialist food producers in the Scottish/English borders , 2005 .

[23]  Moya Kneafsey,et al.  Producer constructions of quality in regional speciality food production : a case study from south west England , 2000 .

[24]  A. Sayer.  For a Critical Cultural Political Economy , 2001 .

[25]  J. Murdoch,et al.  Quality, Nature, and Embeddedness: Some Theoretical Considerations in the Context of the Food Sector* , 2000 .

[26]  Richard Blundel,et al.  Network evolution and the growth of artisanal firms: a tale of two regional cheese makers , 2002 .

[27]  G. Bristow,et al.  Food supply chain approaches: exploring their role in rural development. , 2000 .

[28]  Kees De Roest,et al.  Reconsidering ‘Traditional’ Food: The Case of Parmigiano Reggiano Cheese , 2000 .

[29]  Cynthia Cone,et al.  Community-supported agriculture: a sustainable alternative to industrial agriculture? , 2000 .

[30]  David Goodman,et al.  Globalising food : agrarian questions and global restructuring , 1997 .

[31]  C. Hinrichs,et al.  Embeddedness and local food systems: notes on two types of direct agricultural market☆ , 2000 .

[32]  Henry Buller,et al.  The local food sector , 2003 .

[33]  Sarah Whatmore,et al.  Nourishing Networks: Alternative Geographies of Food , 1997 .

[34]  M. Callon,et al.  The economy of qualities , 2002 .

[35]  J. Pretty.  The living land : agriculture, food and community regeneration in rural Europe , 1998 .

[36]  T. Marsden,et al.  Reregulating the UK Dairy Industry: The Changing Nature of Competitive Space , 1997 .

[37]  C. Hinrichs.  The practice and politics of food system localization , 2003 .

[38]  Peter Jones,et al.  Retailing organic foods , 2001 .

[39]  G. Enticott.  Risking the rural: nature, morality and the consumption of unpasteurised milk , 2003 .