Agroecology and Food Sovereignty in the British Maritime Uplands

The agriculture, communities, and landscapes of the British Maritime Uplands are at a crossroads. The EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) has shifted farm support away from production-related subsidy towards a mix of direct support and environmental/rural development payments. Agricultural productivism has reduced its stranglehold on land use, whilst new opportunities have emerged for ‘post-productivism’ -ecosystem services, eco-tourism, artisanal production of food, crafts and cultural assets. The resulting bifurcated rural economy is characterized by irresilience, however: productivist farming is viable only through receipt of direct payments from CAP Pillar 1; the non-farm economy is dependent on external markets; rural to urban migration continues; and landscape expresses a binary between ‘de-natured’ productivism and ‘de-cultured’ ‘wilderness’. Such irresilience is overlaid by legacies of highly unequal distribution of land and income. In the light of this, and anticipating climate change and a post-fossil carbon age in which a premium will be placed on food security and socio-ecological resilience within a bioregional context, it is timely to ask whether agroecology/food sovereignty might be appropriate models to apply to these upland areas.
Aim and Objectives:
Aim: To clarify the feasibility of agroecological production and to identify the political opportunities for, and constraints on, the implementation of food sovereignty principles in the British Maritime Uplands.
Objectives:
• To gain an understanding of agricultural, related land use practices, and agrarian social systems of the uplands in the in the pre-modern/pre-capitalist era;
• To synthesise the experiences of these areas during the transition to capitalist/productivist agriculture in terms of land use change, land tenure, food security, and social structure;
• To assess the nature of the current agricultural and land use conjuncture defined by contested policy frameworks: productivism; post-productivist ‘consumption countryside’; community/small farmer-based agroecology;
• To assess the socio-ecological experiences and feasibility of the latter policy framework in terms of diversified agricultural and land use systems (e.g. agro-forestry), food and energy security, biodiversity conservation, land tenure and land reform, and community sustainability.
Methodology: The research will initially undertake a desktop study, collating the relevant literatures on the uplands drawn from land use history, historical /political ecology. Empirical research will be directed to the current policy conjuncture, the identification of policy discourses and their constituencies of support through methodologies such as critical discourse analysis. It will develop the implications of those policies for resilience indicators in terms of food security, community viability, social equity, environmental/resource sustainability. Special consideration will be given to the experiences of agroecology practitioners and advocates through interviews and more open discussion forums, including with bodies such as the Landworkers’ Alliance, Agro-Forestry Research Trust, Scottish Crofters Federation. Synthesis of agroecological experiences will draw, inter alia, on the Permaculture Association’s network of demonstration sites (LAND centres) located in upland environments.