Globalization and Agri-Food Restructuring

by Burch, David; Rickson, Roy E.; Lawrence, Geoffrey

• ISBN13: 9781859723807
• ISBN10: 1859723802
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1997-01-01
• Publisher: Avebury

Summary

This collection draws on recent advances in the 'new political economy of agriculture' to analyze the role of the Australasia region in the 'globalization' of agriculture and in the processes of restructuring which have transformed national agri-food systems. The book brings together the work of researchers from Australia and New Zealand, who have analyzed the impact of agricultural transformation at the local, national, regional and the global level. Attention is paid to the insights provided by the analysis of three countries in particular, and the linkages established between them; Australia, where a significant export agri-food sector is increasingly coming under 'foreign' control; New Zealand, where a long period of restructuring has resulted in a profound social change; and Thailand, where a dynamic agri-food sector is providing new insights into the process of globalization and the impacts this is having on agriculture and rural society in the Third World.

Table of Contents

Figures and tables	viii	(3)
List of contributors	xi	(4)
Preface	xv
1 Introduction: Australasian perspectives on agri-food restructuring	1	(16)
David Burch
Roy E. Rickson
Geoffrey Lawrence
Part One: Theoretical perspectives	17	(90)
2 Theoretical issues in global agri-food restructuring	17	(28)
Frederick H. Buttel
3 Contemporary agri-food restructuring: Australia and New Zealand	45	(28)
Geoffrey Lawrence
4 Eco-commodity systems: Historical geographies of context, articulation and embeddedness under capitalism	73	(18)
Richard Le Heron
Michael Roche
5 The detraditionalization of farming	91	(16)
Ian Gray
Part Two: Commodity analysis	107	(66)
6 The uneasy transition to globalization: Restructuring of the Australian tomato processing industry	107	(20)
David Burch
Bill Pritchard
7 Australian sugar in the global economy: Recent trends, emerging problems	127	(12)
Linda Hungerford
8 Restructuring in the Australian dairy industry: The reconstruction and reinvention of co-operatives	139	(14)
Bill Pritchard
9 Organic agriculture in New Zealand: Corporate greening, transnational corporations and sustainable agriculture	153	(20)
Hugh Campbell
Part Three: Trends in the growing, marketing and retailing of foods	173	(98)
10 Contract farming in organizational agriculture: The effects upon farmers and the environment	173	(30)
Roy E. Rickson
David Burch
11 Contract farming under globally-oriented and locally-emergent agribusiness in Tasmania	203	(16)
Leigh Miller
12 Farmer decision making under contract farming in northern Tasmania	219	(20)
Amabel L.A. Fulton
Robert J. Clark
13 Agro-industrialization and social change within the Australian context: A case study of the fast food industry	239	(12)
Kristen Lyons
14 Supermarkets and the supply of fresh fruit and vegetables in Australia: Implications for wholesale markets	251	(20)
Hermione Parsons
Part Four: Linking the local and the global	271	(74)
15 Linking the global and the local: Ethnographic perspectives on farm practice and the globalization of agriculture	271	(12)
Emily Phillips
16 The globalized agriculture-finance relation: South Australian farm families and communities in a new regulatory environment	283	(18)
Neil Argent
17 Entrenched farm indebtedness and the process of agrarian change: A case study and its implications	301	(22)
Peter J. Smailes
18 Globalized agriculture and agri-food restructuring in southeast Asia: The Thai experience	323	(22)
David Burch
Index	345