Why do tobacco farmers continue to produce tobacco in light of the bleak future of this crop? Given the changing political economy of tobacco, we might expect producers to respond by diversifying their enterprises. This study of Kentucky burley tobacco farmers finds that farmers express contradictory values toward the economic role of production and the social value of tobacco consumption. The economic value of tobacco is articulated by drawing upon experiential lessons with the crop. These, in turn, are used to (...) inform production processes (reproduction of tobacco farming), all the while castigating the consumption of their commodity. Farmers persist in producing tobacco because of the structural and historical conditions of the region that have engendered a culture of tobacco production. The contradiction in production and consumption values suggests that the “cultural turn” in agro-food studies needs to move away from a linear approach of cultural values as determinants of social action and become sensitive to the differential ways commodity actors produce, use, and reproduce a culture of commodity production and a culture of commodity consumption. This unproblematic and linear association between values and economic activity misinforms social science research about seemingly “individual” motivations that are shaped by historical and structural conditions. (shrink)

This article asks how the application of digital technologies is changing the organization of the agri-food system in the context of the third food regime. The academic debate on digitalization and food largely focuses on the input and farm level. Yet, based on the analysis of 280 digital services and products, we show that digital technologies are now being used along the entire food commodity chain. We argue that digital technologies in the third food regime serve on the one hand (...) as a continuation of established information and communication technologies, thus deepening certain features of the existing food regime such as the retail sector’s control over global commodity chains. On the other hand, digital technologies also introduce new forms of control and value extraction based on the use of data and pave the way for large tech companies to take over market shares in the agri-food sector. Finally, we find that multinational agri-food companies are starting to take on the business models of leading digital tech companies, for instance by developing digital platforms throughout the agri-food system. We argue that this shows that the broader economic restructuring of neoliberal capitalism towards digital capitalism is also making its way into the agri-food system. (shrink)

Global development initiatives frequently promote agricultural commodity chain projects to improve livelihoods. In Morocco, development projects, including the Plan Maroc Vert, have promoted apple production in rural regions of the country. In order to access domestic markets, these new apple producers often use pesticides to meet market standards. Through situated ethnographic inquiry and commodity chain analysis, using a combination of surveys and interviews with apple wholesalers, government officials, along with farmers, this paper works to critique the PMV’s development approach that (...) implicitly values commodification. By exploring interconnected processes of commodification, I link subsidized apple saplings and cold storage infrastructure to the dependence on pesticide usage, which has become a part of daily village life. This has important implications for community health and riparian ecosystems. Alternatively, I propose how we can imagine different development trajectories that decommodify livelihoods by focusing on local knowledge creation and diversification strategies. (shrink)