A Food Systems Perspective on Seafood by Prof. Peter Oosterveer

In recent years, a food systems perspective has been promoted to develop a more comprehensive perspective on supplying sufficient, sustainable and healthy food to consumers. This shift away from an orientation in research and policy on increasing food production towards a focus on consumers and dietary outcomes seems promising in many respects. At the same time, this perspective needs further reflection with respect to focus and integration.

1. A Food Systems Perspective on Seafood 23 November 2018 Peter Oosterveer Professor at the Environmental Policy Group

2. Supermarket supported area-based management and certification of aquaculture in Southeast Asia (SUPERSEAS ) – Project Vietnam and Thailand Partners: Wageningen University & Research Worldfish (dr. Mohan Prince of Songkla University Mekong Delta Development & Research Institute (MD), Can Tho University, Prince of Sonkla University, Sustainable Fisheries Partnership, BRAC, AquaParc, Vietnam Pangasius Association, GLZ, Stark Consulting, York Centre for Asian Research (YCAR ), Bao Minh Insurance Company 2

3. A4NH PROGRAM STRUCTURE FLAGSHIP 1 FOOD SYSTEMS FOR HEALTHIER DIETS FLAGSHIP 5 IMPROVING HUMAN HEALTH FLAGSHIP 4 SUPPORTING POLICIES, PROGRAMS, AND ENABLING ACTION THROUGH RESEARCH FLAGSHIP 3 FOOD SAFETY FLAGSHIP 2 BIOFORTIFICATION COUNTRY COORDINATION AND ENGAGEMENT (CCE) UNIT MONITORING, EVALUATION, AND LEARNING (MEL) UNIT GENDER, EQUITY, AND EMPOWERMENT (GEE) UNIT CoA 1: Diagnosis and foresight: Linking dietary and food system transformations CoA 2: Food system innovations CoA 3: Upscaling and anchoring of food system transformation CoA 1: Crop development mainstreaming and capacity building CoA 2: Delivery science and developing lessons learned CoA 3: Promoting an enabling environment CoA 1: Evidence That Counts CoA 2: Safe Fresh Foods CoA 3: Aflatoxin Mitigation CoA 1: Nutrition-Sensitive Agricultural Programs (NSAP) CoA 2: Supporting Countries through Research on Enabling Environments (SCORE) CoA 3: Capacity, Collaboration, Convening (3C) CoA 1: Diseases in agricultural landscapes CoA 2: Emerging and Neglected Zoonotic Diseases CoA 3: Global Challenges on Agriculture and Health Agriculture for Nutrition and Health (A4NH)

4. Outline Why do we need food systems? What are food systems? Fish food systems? Applying a fish food system perspective

5. Food systems approach – a brief history (1) 1950 – 1960s: world hunger problem lack of food => need to increase production focus on technological innovation => ‘Green Revolution’ 1970s – 1990s: spreading the technological innovations to more farmers (especially Africa) continued research on technological innovation in agriculture to improve productivity m itigate the negative (social and ecological) impacts

6. Food systems – a brief history (2) 1990s – 2008: hunger is lack of rural development agri -food chains perspective combining: global value chains (power and control) supply chain management (logistics and business management) market infrastructure (finance, physical infrastructure, information and communication) smallholder upgrading strategies l ivelihoods approaches s trengthening markets promoting economic development in general with little specific attention to agriculture and food

7. Food systems approach – a brief history (3) 2008 – today: food systems: address multiple challenges in combination because of trade-offs and synergies: g lobalisation u rbanisation => consumers and their lifestyle much more central sustainability challenges (climate change and biodiversity loss) m ultiple burdens of malnutrition (hunger, micro-nutrient deficiencies, obesity) f ocus on consumers: universal access to sufficient and healthy food; dietary outcomes

8. What are food systems? conceptual framework => analytical tool NOT a model of everything that can be steered towards desired outcomes by pushing the rights buttons a conceptual tool to take more complexity into consideration when addressing food-related challenges trade-offs s ynergies u nintended consequences f ramework for development that is guided by knowledge of particular policy interests (strategic simplicity)

9. Key elements of food systems f rom consumption to production and vice versa m ulti-stakeholder involvement formal and informal actors and practices multi-level and multi-scale complexity adaptive governance; flexibility; learning by doing

10. Ericksen , 2009

11. HLPE 2017

12. Dietary outcomes

13. Analysing fish food systems: challenges (Ericksen, 2008) h olistic approach: not only analysing the component parts and the actors but also the interactions between them multi-scale and multilevel: even if the outcomes are focused on only one scale in particular institutions are central: food systems are coupled social and ecological systems mediated by institutions i ntegration between disciplines and approaches remains challenging 18

14. Contributions from applying a food systems perspective f ood systems’ perspectives developed to address key challenges in contemporary food provision: triple burden of nutrition s ustainability: climate change, biodiversity loss, etc. g lobalisation: shifting roles of key supply chain actors and transforming governance arrangements more attention for: consumers/consumption rather than production only complexity, feedback loops and unintended consequences still: multiple definitions and multiple foci of attention

15. Food systems and seafood seafood has a history of separate domains: fisheries : management as an challenge for ecology and marine biology aquaculture : increased productivity as a challenge for aquaculture technology and economic development seafood is an essential part of food security and therefore of food systems (Béne et al, 2016): nutrition and health important source of animal proteins for the poor wider relevance important source of livelihood for many people i mportant contributor to economic development for some countries core element in aquatic ecosystems 20

16. Fish Food Systems framework for analysing the complex dynamic nature of seafood in a more integrated manner: e conomic e cological nutritional c ultural t echnological a nalysing food systems requires interdisciplinarity : social sciences are essential part because social dynamics is not a separate section of a fish food system but core to its functioning and transformation 21

17. Flows and networks as a framework for analysing sustainable seafood (Bush & Oosterveer, 2019) g oing beyond market-based (GVC) and individual-initiative-based approaches to sustainable seafood: reduces a broad range of social interactions to structural rules and transactions a flows and networks perspective highlights public and private social relations in structuring global flows and how they shape the conditions for sustainability practices: attention on the flows that shape existing practices regulating flows involves many more actors than just producers t ranscends the current notion of public/private divide t he state is a key actor in shaping (not opposing) the constitution of global flows, globalisation and global seafood provision 22

18. Developing a food systems perspective (Bush & Oosterveer, 2019) 23

19. Analysing certification from a systems perspective (Bush & Oosterveer, 2019) 24

20. Analysing fish food systems: zooming in and zooming out fish food systems perspectives illustrate complexity, so how to use this approach for research? combine and balance in-depth focal analysis and broad perspective: zooming in: focus on a particular theme/topic zooming out: view the theme/topic as being embedded in the wider system framework a ssessing sustainable seafood systems requires technical sustainability performance measurements as well as understanding them as social processes

21. Conclusions sustainable seafood requires expanding beyond fisheries and aquaculture separately or even in combination f ood systems provide the basic conceptual framework for analysing sustainable seafood but needs further elaboration: conceptualisation : for instance ‘networks and flows’ perspective’ adequate recognition of the role social sciences; beyond addressing ‘social issues’ in separation methodological: combining multiple levels and scales of analysis adequate governance towards sustainable fish food systems brings in different actors at different locations along the (global) seafood production-consumption chain

22. Thank you for your attention 27