Common Visions Between Farmers and Consumers as a Tool to Characterize “New” Agro-Food Markets - European Society for Ecological Economics conference ESEE Instanbul 2011

Several alternative forms of trade in the agro-food market are spreading in Italy at local and global levels, namely: Farmers’ Market; Solidarity Purchasing Groups, Organized Demand and Supply Groups; Product Adoptions; Solidarity Trade Districts; Farm Shops. These have been introduced as a reaction to the global standardization and homologation of agricultural products leading to biodiversity loss. This research aims at examining more in detail how social and economic relations are connected in the new food market channels. The main result focuses on the central role of relational communication between the subjects involved in the process. Communication means the sharing of information about products, producers and farming systems. In the different forms of alternative circuits in the agro-food system, the attention is mainly focused on a particular type of product trade, the Solidarity Purchasing Groups. Solidarity Purchasing Groups consist of people meeting to make collective purchases of different food and non-food products. People who are part of the buying groups are linked by shared consumption choices. The producers and products to be bought are chosen carefully according to farming methods, normally organic, and producer characteristics favouring small farmers. The case study analysis was developed from a direct survey. The questionnaires were sent by mail to the representatives of Solidarity Purchasing Groups of Northeastern Italy (Veneto, Friuli Venezia Giulia and Trentino). 202 questionnaires were collected from 24 Solidarity Purchasing Groups registered on the official SPG web site and 5 from unregistered SPG sites. The analysis of the answers given by the consumers shows the role of relational communication which is the basis of the social network built up through consumers and producers on the local scale. The results of this research were interpreted by using economic theories based on communication and relationship such as the Stewardship Theory (Davis et al., 1997) Relational communication is the taxonomical key which makes the Solidarity Purchasing Groups different from the other alternative circuits in agro-food market.