Food sovereignty in the Global South

The present post-graduation seminar is inserted in a context other than the nutritional quests that are only adensam in the Human Sciences, as evidenced by the need for transdisciplinary analyzes of the reciprocal influences that determine the interactions between individuals, classes and states as they vary. socioeconomic, political and international relations.

On the one hand, access to food as a direction and direction for public policies should be a debate merely linked to the availability of two foods, or to the nutritional aspects related to them. On the other hand, this complexity brings to light the relevance of deeper reflections about access and detention in the medium and production technologies, the domestic and cross-border food influences, and the qualitative and quantitative dimensions of the quests related to food justice and sovereignty.

In this context, Latin America is presented as the epicenter of many challenges and debates related to this question, based on epistemological constructions around these concepts, based on their effectiveness.

Regarding the current concept of "food sovereignty", as discussed around the way it is consolidated from a political approach that emphasizes as a result of social relations of predatory production (Castro 1983). Family farming, for example, configures some two patterns of resistance that agricultural development can assume for the dissemination of monocultures and two large-scale export models, subsequently modernized by agribusiness and the emergence of corporations as social actors. Além da pretensão de remodelo a força de trabalho agrária, as discussed in the Global World perpassam pela educação and pela relation with nature (FAO 2002; Niyéléni 2007).

Furthermore, the deindustrialization of Latin America and the growing exports of food across flows to the North and South Globally, with an emphasis on China's growing role, as well as the cyclical trend in the production of some commodities, in both subcontinents, we can employ the regions in directed to the large landowners and capitalists espoliação, or by changes in the production chains that prioritize the family farming system and, consequently, new subjects and forms of lidar with nature and capital.

In Latin America, the discussion is also based on a high level of engagement with rural mobilization and an intersection between ethnic minorities (mainly indigenous groups), traditional populations and agriculture, with direct implications for the debate on food sovereignty. In the Brazilian case, for example, more than 70% of domestic food consumption comes from family farming. Therefore, only 93.000 properties (1,6% of the total) correspond to about 47% of the total area of ​​rural properties, about 30% of the Brazilian territory (IBGE 2019).

Some of these contrasts between subjects, production and access to food are exacerbated by the discrepant management policies of the COVID-19 pandemic, on local, regional and global levels, considering also that they show challenges related to the most basic dimensions of food security.  

In this way, the importance of introducing conceptually and concretely these variables, in addition to discussing the existing intersections and impacts that determine the context of the Global South, especially Latin American, is essential to understand our realities on multiple levels.

Objective

• The General Objective of the course is to promote transdisciplinary discussions regarding food issues and their environmental impacts, putting into perspective two global subjects that are part of this agri-food link between Latin America and Asia. Also, the readings that base each session of the course are from South Global researchers who are active in international debates about the topic. Intuitively, in addition to expanding this research agenda, it will also make it accessible to the non-specialized public.

Specific objectives

• Create and consolidate a network of researchers and activists involved in agri-food debates and their flows, especially in the context of the relationship between Latin America and Asia, which involves the students and allows their research to advance individually and collectively.
• Reflect on food questions and their environmental impacts and organize final reflections in a book.
• Expand the impact of the discussions beyond the classroom, through the contribution of articles to Wikipédia that can draw critical knowledge of the content in a more accessible way to the community.

• Food changes and their impacts on the relations between Asia and Latin America
• Epistemological alternatives in the interactions between the Global South: an analysis from and to the agri-food challenges 
• The human direction to food and nutrition: a transdisciplinary discussion 
• Food and inequalities: public policies, sustainability and agriculture  
• Justiça Alimentar: Food Systems and Social Movements 
• Working class, social movements and struggle for food sovereignty: subjectivities and demands  
• Asian Presence in Latin America in the Light of the Food Industry
• Thinking about food from its environmental impact
• Interfaces between security, food sovereignty and territory: “landgrabbing” and geopolitics in South-South relations
• Agri-food cooperation between Latin America and Asia in the direction of the future

• BELIK, W. Study on the food chain. Rio de Janeiro, RJ: Instituto Clima e Sociedade, 2020.
• BORRAS JR, Saturnino M.; KAY, Cristóbal; GÓMEZ, Sergio; WILKINSON, John. Land grabbing and capitalist accumulation: key aspects in Latin America. Interdisciplinary Journal of Agrarian Studies No. 38 - 1st semester of 2013, pp. 75-103. 
• CARBALLO GONZÁLEZ, Carlos. Food Sovereignty and Development: Paths and Horizons in Argentina. Buenos Aires: Monadanomana. 2018
• CASTRO, Josué de. A Geopolitica da Fome. São Paulo: Editora, 1955.
• COSTA LIMA, Marcos. How to produce more food while reducing environmental impacts? Jornalismo e Cidadania Magazine, no. 28, pp. 18-20, 2019. 
• CUMARU, João; PEREIRA, Mariana Yante Barreto. Guiding food security between local and inter-regional: the BRICS and their (in)congruences. In: Estrangeirização de Terras e Segurança Alimentar e Nutricional: Brasil e China en Perspectiva. Recife, FASA: 2019. 
• DE CARVALHO, Horacio Martins; STEDILE, João Pedro. Food sovereignty: A necessity of the Peoples. 07/11/11.  
• FAO, IFAD, UNICEF, WFP and WHO. The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2021. Transforming food systems for food security, better nutrition and affordable and healthy diets for all. Rome, FAO. 2021. 
• FAO. Food and Nutritional Security: Basic Concepts. In: Special Program for Food Security (PESA) Central America. Food Facility Project Honduras. 3rd Edition. Honduras. 2011.
• GARCÍA, María Carrascosa; GARCÍA, Daniel López; CORTÉS, Jorge Molero. Public policy proposals at the municipal level. In: Local food systems facing global risks: from the climate crisis to COVID-19. Valladolid, Spain: Fundación Entretantos and Red de Ciudades por la Agroecología: 2020, pp. 30-51.
• GRIGORI, Pedro. As Syngenta persecuted scientists for decades to reduce the risk of two pesticides. 05/21/2021. Brasil de Fato.
• HASE UETA, M.; WEINS, N.W.; BARBIERI, MD; ELIAS, L. de P. Global food chains: A look at the changes in our consumption patterns in China and their impacts on productive relations in Brazil. In: Anais do VI Conference of BRICS Initiative of Critical Agrarian Studies, Brasília, BR. Brasília, BR: Aug 30 2018. 
• MAMANI DE MARCHESE, A.; FILIPPONE, MP. Bioinputs: key components of sustainable agriculture. Rev. agron. northwest arg., San Miguel de Tucumán, v. 38, no. 1, p. 9-21, Jun. 2018.   
• MARINI, Ruy M. Dialectics of dependency. Mexico City: Era. 1973.
• MARTINS, Horacio; STEDILE, João Pedro. Food sovereignty: A necessity of the Peoples. In: Biodiversity LA. 2011. 
• MYERS, Margaret; GUO, Jie. China's Agricultural Investment in Latin America: A Critical Assessment (translated version).
• OLIVEIRA, Gustavo. Resistance to Chinese appropriation of land in Brazil since 2008: agroecological solutions and alternatives. In: Dossiê Relações Brazil-China. Idéias Magazine, v. 9, n.2, jul./dez. 2018, pp. , p. 99-132, 2018. DOI: 10.20396/ideias.v9i2.8655285. 
• UN. Synthesis of Independent Dialogues. Report 2. In: 2021 Summit on Food Systems. 2021. 
• PACHÓN, Paola Jenny; MEDINA-MORENO, Melisa; PACHÓN-ARIZA, Fabio Alberto. Hunger: an approach from food security to the right to food. Management and Environment 21(2), pp. 291-304. 2018.
• PADILLA, Mamen; GUZMÁN, Eduardo. Contributing to the construction of Food Sovereignty from Agroecology. In: Political Ecology. No. 38, Agriculture of the 21st Century, pp. 43-51. 2009.
• PASTORINO, Leonardo Fabio. Food security, a pretentious concept. 2020.
• PENNA, Camila Penna; CARVALHO, Priscila Delgado; MOTTA, Renata Campos; TEIXEIRA, Marco Antonio. Food systems in dispute: responses from two social movements to the Covid-19 pandemic. Anais do Congresso ANPOCS. 2020.
• TRASE. Brazilian soybean production chains in China. 2019. 
• TRASE. Brazilian soybean supply chains in China. 2019. 
• TRICONTINENTAL. Popular Agrarian Reform and Fight for Terra in Brazil. Dossiê n. 27, Tricontinental Institute of Social Research. April, 2020. 
• VALENTE, Flávio. Towards the full realization of the human direction of adequate food and nutrition. In: Land estrangement and nutritional and nutritional security: Brazil and China in perspective. Recife, FASA. pp. 131-170. 2019. 
• VASCONCELOS, André; GUIDOTTI, Vinícius; LÖFREN, Pernilla; PINTO, Luis Fernando Guedes. The environmental conformity of soybean production in Brazil: an underestimated risk in international markets. TRASE. 2019.

The basic requirements for taking a seminar are:

• Availability of at least 4 hours per week to dedicate to the seminar course.
• Internet access.
• Reasonable handling of communication and computer tools.
• Language proficiency in the language in which the course will be taught. The official languages ​​are Spanish and Portuguese.

The seminars last 12 weeks, plus the completion of a final project. A total of 90 hours of dedication will be credited.

A course consists of twelve classes, each accompanied by required readings, supplementary readings, discussion forums, and learning activities proposed by the teaching team, as well as partial submissions and a final project. The course is delivered online and asynchronously. Some instructors may propose synchronous activities. In these cases, the time and date will be agreed upon in advance between the teaching team and the students to ensure everyone's participation. To pass the seminar, students must participate in at least 80% of the discussion forums and activities proposed by the instructors, complete all scheduled partial submissions, and pass the final project.

The possible payment methods are credit card, bank transfer and bank deposit.