Food Systems Under Pressure

Abstract

This special section represents an exciting new multiplatform collection that contains a range of contributions that all focus on contemporary food systems and the ways in which they operate to influence consumption patterns. In addition to conventional research papers, the section also includes a Sociology in Action paper containing a shorter opinion piece and Beyond the Text, which is a creative audio-visual contribution. Some of the papers derive from the seventh conference of the British Sociological Association Food Studies Group held in Prato, 24–25 June 2019. The theme of the original conference was food systems and society, given that throughout the world food systems face many challenges ranging from climate change and sustainability, trade wars and financialization, urbanization and ageing societies in addition to persisting social inequalities and food insecurity. Since the conference food systems have also had to deal with the Covid pandemic and, in the UK, Brexit. Indeed, the global pandemic served to further expose national and international food inequalities, as well as the complexity and fragility of food systems (Kakaei et al., 2022). Many of these themes were thus revisited in the 2021 BSA Food Study Group Conference Food, Food Systems and Times of Insecurity, including how to link change at the macro-level and with everyday practices.