Xavier Simón Fernández

MAKING A LIVING: GRASSROOTS DEVELOPMENT INITIATIVES, NATURAL RESOURCE MANAGEMENT AND INSTITUTIONAL SUPPORT IN GALICIA, SPAIN

Making a living: Grassroots development initiatives, natural resource management and institutional support in Galicia, Spain European policy increasingly supports territorially based rural development in which local actors play a decisive role in realising economically, socially and ecologically responsible development. This paper makes use of four case-studies, from a largely depopulated mountainous area in Galicia, Spain, where local people strive to combine the creation of new businesses with the revitalisation of the natural resource base. The paper, in analysing local knowledge infrastructure and its interface with policy, reveals the dominant role of grassroots development initiatives in effecting regional learning and capacity building. Further it is acknowledged that in Galicia progress is brokered in practice by individual stakeholders who manage structural constraints, cross boundaries and construct new cross-cutting, bridging networks. It is also apparent that these niche-actors constitute a largely untapped reservoir of knowledge brokers that could be used much more effectively if more direct cooperation with policymakers and the existing knowledge infrastructure could be achieved. Las políticas europeas apoyan cada vez más un desarrollo rural territorial en el que los actores locales juegan un papel decisivo al realizar un desarrollo económico, social y ecológicamente responsable. Este artículo utiliza cuatro estudios de caso localizados en un área con problemas de despoblación en Galicia, España. En los cuatro casos los actores luchan por combinar la creación de nuevas empresas con la revitalización de la base local de recursos naturales. El artículo analiza la infraestructura de conocimiento local y sus interfaces con el ámbito político. De esta forma revela el papel dominante que las iniciativas de desarrollo enraizadas en lo local tienen en la construcción del conocimiento regional y de la capacidad de implementación. En Galicia el progreso se construye a nivel práctico gracias a la labor individual de actores que son capaces de manejar limitaciones estructurales, cruzar límites y construir nuevas redes que facilitan sus objetivos. Así, estos actores-nicho constituyen una amplia y no del todo estudiada reserva de conocimiento, que podría utilizarse de forma más efectiva si se lograse una cooperación más directa con los hacedores de política y la infraestructura de conocimiento ya existentes.

Analysis of the transport of imported food in Spain and its contribution to global warming

Through the process of globalization, food has experienced an intense territorial restructuring process. Local agric-food links have weakened at the same time as daily products arrived from distant lands. There is presently a wide international debate on the importance of transport in the configuration of the agric-food system and its contribution in terms of greenhouse gas (GHG). The direct environmental costs of the transport of imported food, that is the ‘external food miles’, have been estimated in kilometer (km), ton (t), ton-kilometer (t-km) and GHG in Spain between 1995 and 2011. The analysis is made by ten food groups including 136 products, with special attention to the most important ones (cereals and animal feed), as well as by means of transport (air, rail, road and water) and from 113 different countries belonging to six geographical areas. Two phases are identified during this period: an expansive phase (1995–2007), in which the t-km of imported food increased from 81.8 to 147.8 million t-km and environmental pressure rose from 3.1 to 5.4 million CO 2 -eq t, and a recession phase (2007–2011), in which environmental pressure subsided as a consequence of the reduction of imports, even though it still remained above the 1995 level. The article reveals a clear interrelation between amounts, distances and modal distribution when it comes to determining the environmental cost of transporting food imports in the two periods studied. It also reflects on the role of the external food miles in the Spanish agri-food system from a sustainability perspective.

Energy Analysis of Organic Farming in Andalusia (Spain)

High oil dependence and energy inefficiency are structural characteristics of industrialized agricultural systems. In a context of climate change and growing energy shortage as the present one, energy indicators should be increasingly taken into account as measures of environmental sustainability, efficiency, and technical-productive viability in analyses and decision-making processes in the field of agriculture. One of the most relevant characteristics of agriculture is its capacity to transform energy and to generate an energy “surplus” that has very diverse uses (human feeding, animal feeding, fertilization, etc.). This energy surplus is potentially greater in organic farming. However, empirical studies analyzing the aggregate energy performance of organic farming and allowing an assessment of the scope and energy limitations of this type of production are few. This work analyses the energy performance of organic farming in Andalusia, the southern region of Spain, both in an aggregate form and by large groups of crops, through the energy assessment of its output, inputs and energy efficiency (ER). The energy ratio of Andalusian organic farming in 2005 was estimated by 1.40, the extensive crops (2.86), horticultural crops (0.18), citrus fruits (0.39), subtropical fruits (0.85), other fruits (1.64), nuts (0.54), olive (2.08), and vine (0.76).

Fighting for a future: an actor-oriented planning approach to landscape preservation in Galicia

Economic optimisation of the gross margin per hectare in agriculture reduces diversity, coherence and identity of cultural landscapes. Hence, landscape preservation calls for changes in the social–ecological organisation of places, which implies complex transitional processes towards new management regimes. These are supported by CAP reforms (Horizon, 2014–2020) that increasingly turn from individual production subsidies to farmers to the collective management of natural resources and the related ecosystem services. This article explores the opportunities for landscape preservation in Galicia, Spain. The central question is: ‘How to develop a successful planning approach in the context of a geographically peripheral area facing severe ecological, social and economic vulnerabilities?’ In the case study area, contrasting viewpoints on landscape preservation among rural dwellers, entrepreneurs and representatives of institutions point to power issues on control over the natural environment, but also provide input for the development of an actor-oriented approach to landscape preservation. This article provides a ‘tool’ for catching up with the EU objectives of sustainable, inclusive and smart growth and contributes to our understanding of how place-based development in EU programs can be combined with landscape management in Galicia.

Energy Indicators for Organic Livestock Production: A Case Study from Andalusia, Southern Spain

This work analyzes the energy performance of organic livestock farming in Andalusia (Spain), both as an industry and by type of livestock, through the application of the energy analysis methodology adapted in this article to the study of the organic livestock farming. From this perspective, it is possible to observe that organic livestock farming has a great capacity to use resources and generate outputs in the form of products of animal origin and, especially, manure, which is an important resource for agricultural fertilization. The energy efficiency of organic livestock farming in Andalusia is estimated at 0.08. If the manure reused by agriculture is considered an output, the efficiency of the industry reaches 0.32. Also, 28% of the energy consumed by the industry is nonrenewable and the energy efficiency in relation to the use of nonrenewable energy is estimated at 1.38. By type of livestock, the energy efficiency in relation to the use of nonrenewable energy is estimated at 1.78, 1.62, 0.84, 0.57, 0.22 for goats, cattle, sheep, pigs, and poultry. These results show the capacity of extensive organic livestock farming to reduce energy costs and improve its energy efficiency.