Can We Be More Collaborative? Top-Down Policies and Urban–Rural Divides in the Ecological Agriculture Sector in Nanjing, China

Abstract

Embeddedness has long been used to study collaborations and tensions between food initiatives, but less attention has been paid to this topic in both the vertical and formal contexts of governmental systems and the horizontal and vernacular contexts of local culture. Such interrogations are essential for understanding the challenges for advancing food initiatives. This study uses the case of ecological agriculture in Nanjing, China to investigate the vertical embeddedness shaped by policy networks and horizontal embeddedness carved into local social configurations. We conclude that strong government supports facilitated large-scale modern ecological agriculture enterprises, at the expense of small-scale ecological farms. Furthermore, the tensions between new farmers and local farmers attributed to the broad urban-rural divide also impede recently established ecological farm operations. Strategies are needed to address these social divides between ecological farms in order for them to be collaborative in China and in other similar social-political settings.

Keywords:

• Ecological agriculture
• horizontal embeddedness
• new farmers
• urban-rural divide
• vertical embeddedness

Notes

1 These regulatory plans include restrictions on use of fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides, and on recycling of agricultural wastes.

2 OFDC was China’s first organic certification body. It used to be an affiliate of Nanjing environmental protection bureau, and recently shifted its status to a shareholding company. It is actively involved in shaping China’s national organic standards.

3 While local villagers seldom encounter the problem of lacking laborers, because the mutual supported relations in the village allow them to find helpers if in need.

Additional information

Funding

The present work was funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.