Abstract
The Vega of Granada is a traditional peri-urban agricultural bioregion that includes important environmental and heritage values. As it belongs to the urban agglomeration of Granada, the agricultural land has been affected by the urban sprawl and other impacts of the contemporary metropolitan model. The strategic position of this fertile land and the growing interes in local and organic food products give an opportunity to the Vega of Granada to recover the basic role that it played before the new trends imposed by the global food system. Following to a bioregional approach, this chapter explains some of the participative processes that were activated to develop the alternative food system, mainly considering the use of short food supply chains to distribute and sell the agricultural products of the Vega of Granada. The success of some of those activities and the increase in the consumption of local products demonstrate the importance of participation as a key question in relocalising the food systems and increase the resilience of the peri-urban agricultural land.
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Notes
- 1.
We must clarify that the area of the UAG does not exactly coincide with the agricultural region of the Vega of Granada. Despite presenting similar dimensions, the UAG includes those municipalities which show a clear functional urban connection with the city and its surroundings, but do not necessarily contain spaces regarded as plains within the majority of their expanse. In the case of the UAG, its municipal composition is institutionally defined, while the limits of the Vega are imprecise; they may extend to the west along the Geníl Valley towards Loja, or not. They may contain some municipalities with part of their surface area on the mountainside, or not, according to the perspective of the different authors and subject matter (Calatrava 2014).
- 2.
Albolote, Alfacar, Alhendín, Armilla, Atarfe, Cájar, Cenes de la Vega, Chauchina, Churriana de la Vega, Cijuela, Colonera, Cúllar Vega, Dílar, Fuente Vaqueros, Las Gabias, Gójar, Granada, Güevejar, Huetor Vega, Jun, Láchar, Maracena, Monachil, Ogíjares, Peligros, Pinos Genil, Pinos Puente, Pulianas, Santa Fe, Valderrubio, Vegas del Genil, Otura, Víznar and La Zubia.
- 3.
Short food supply chains are understood as those strategies and initiatives which arise in order to articulate new geographical relationships of proximity between production and demand using paradigms which reinforce food sovereignty (Yacaman Ochoa et al. 2019).
- 4.
Self-managed group of like-minded people to group their alternative, organic and supportive consumption with the rural world (Vivas 2010). It works with orders that are made directly to the local organic producers at a fair price. Generally, the orders are on a weekly basis and they are delivered to a delivery point located in the neighbourhood or village where the consumers live (being a local initiative, the location of the delivery point is normally close to where the products originate from).
- 5.
It is a way of supporting producers who still do not hold official organic certification, and it responds to the consumer interest in knowing the origin of their food and the people who produce it. It is a synergic way to establish relationships with the surroundings and the people who care for the territory through their work.
- 6.
The school canteen “Donde comen los monstruos” is an initiative that arose in a central neighbourhood of the city of Granada (in the Realejo), and according to the definition of its members, it consists of a group of families interested in healthy food and/or eating in the best way we can, that is to say, food made on the same day, from fresh local, organic and seasonal products. As families who have fed ourselves in this way for several years, we have enough experience to be able to offer varied and balanced menus on this basis. Various interests come together in this project such as supporting local organic agriculture, caring for the environment, food sovereignty, local economy, healthy food, etc. The canteen “Donde comen los monstruos” replicates this initiative with certain particularities, which include running it in a way which is more focused on decision making by the people who manage the initiative. Subsequently, in 2018, a third example, the canteen “A Fuego Lento” was opened in another neighbourhood of the southern area.
- 7.
The northern sector of Granada brings together the most underprivileged neighbourhoods of the city in its district, including Almanjáyar and Casería de Montijo, two of the areas where our case studies take place, the organic allotments, Nortelanos, La Madraza, and the organic community allotments of the Río Beiro.
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Matarán Ruiz, A., Yacamán Ochoa, C. (2020). Participative Agri-Food Projects in the Urban Bioregion of the Vega of Granada (Spain). In: Fanfani, D., Matarán Ruiz, A. (eds) Bioregional Planning and Design: Volume II. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-46083-9_6
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