“Food has gone from being a human right to being a commodity”

In what way do we create a paradigm shift in our food system? Interview with Marta Guadalupe Rivera, Doctor of Veterinary Medicine and Director of the Chair in Agroecology and Food Systems at the UVIC.

Entrevista Marta G. Rivera - Alimentació Sostenible
04/03/2021 - 10:08 h

The current food system is characterised by its industrialised, intensive, globalised nature, draining natural resources and generating multiple social and ecological impacts at all levels. How is that we’ve come to have a food model that’s bad for both our own and our planet’s health? And even more importantly, from where, and in what way, do we create a paradigm shift? During this interview, Marta Guadalupe Rivera, Doctor of Veterinary Medicine and Director of the Chair in Agroecology and Food Systems at the University of Vic – Central University of Catalonia, helps us to understand what sustainable food is, and why it needs to form the basis of our food model.

What do we mean when we talk about sustainable food?

A sustainable food system is one that both promotes and provides safe, nutritious, and healthy food that has a low environmental impact, and that benefits all current and future citizens. It’s also a system that protects and restores the natural environment and its ecosystems; it’s one that’s robust and resistant, economically dynamic, fair, and equitable, while also being socially acceptable and inclusive.

How and why have we arrived at a food system that doesn’t do either our own or our planet’s health any good?

Food has gone from being a human right to being a commodity. This shift in perspective has involved major changes: industrialisation, extractivism, the exploitation of natural resources, etc. If I value an apple as if it were a mobile phone and my objective is to sell as many as possible, then I’m generating a paradigm shift. Farmers are no longer farmers, they are business people. And farms are no longer farms, they are industrialised business concerns. Due to the paradigm shift that has taken place over the last 60 years, agriculture has become part of a global market and, for that reason, it’s necessary to change the narratives about our food system, and go back to the idea that food is a human right, and in that sense belongs to us all.
Taking this as a starting point, new policies need to be developed. If you believe that food is a human right, you have to ensure one of the prerequisites of that right: access to productive resources such as land; if it is a common good, you have to develop systems of governance that enable democratic participation by everyone who is part of the food system, from production to consumption.

We already know that what we have at the moment is no good. Do we know what our food model should be like in the future?

Our future food model needs to take a look back and recover many of the elements from the food model of the past. And it should be built based on clear principles and solid foundations, in terms of both production and consumption. In our region, we have the Mediterranean diet, recognised as a part of humanity’s Intangible Cultural Heritage by UNESCO, and taking this as a starting point, we should build a diet based on local, organic, and seasonal food that comes from biodiversity and from native seeds and breeds.

In fact, this new model has yet to be constructed. In agroecology, we’re working to recover traditional systems and knowledge, but at the same time, entering into debate with scientific knowledge. Without hierarchies and without one form of knowledge taking precedence over another.

It’s often said that eating healthily is more expensive. How much of that is myth, and how much is reality?

The truth is, it’s a bit of both. If your aim is switch to organic food, but to eat exactly the same things without making any changes to your dietary choices, then it will definitely be more expensive. But a healthy, sustainable way of eating means eating less meat, which is one of the more expensive organic products. While a conventional chicken grows to size in 30 days, it takes an organic chicken 80 days. So it’s obvious that if an animal has to be fed for twice as long, the final price is going to be at least twice as much. Another related factor would be if you continue to consume out-of-season food, which is usually more expensive. A healthy, sustainable diet is based on seasonal produce.

It’s also important to note that the reason conventional food is so cheap is that we outsource the social and environmental costs involved, such as pollution. If these costs were assumed internally, things would be very different.

Imagine someone who wants to start eating better. What would be your first three key pieces of advice?

I’d tell them that they should consume seasonal, local, organic produce, reduce the amount of meat they eat, and ensure that the meat that they do eat comes from extensive and/or organic farms.

What role does our food play in the fight against climate change?

It plays a central role. At the moment, food systems contribute to greenhouse gas emissions, and this is due to a change in dietary patterns and in production systems. In regard to our diet, we’ve increased our consumption of food of animal origin, and foods that are out of season, which means food that has been transported over long distances, or highly processed. In terms of production, the industrialisation of food production has meant that agriculture has ceased to be a source of net carbon capture and has become a source of net carbon emissions, due to the associated deforestation, use of fertilisers and methane gas emissions.