The course aims to provide students with a broad, in-depth and critical perspective on the link between international economic law (trade and investments), national legal structures and the construction of a transnational food regime that produces almost 800 million undernourished people and more than 1 billion over-nourished and obese. Rather than being natural, the way in which food is produced, transported, allocated, consumed and discarded is strictly dependent on local and international legal structures. In addition, the current global food system has implications and produces consequences that go far beyond individual health and consumers’ rights.

As the students will discover throughout the course, the act of eating, an operation which is often mechanically conducted and taken for granted (especially in some parts of the world, and by parts of society), is the final point of a complex system in which law interacts with economics, politics, culture, human rights, climate change and several other domains that are often overlooked in discussions about law and food.

In order to achieve its goal, the course is structured on the basis of twelve different ‘containers’ of four three each, whose substance will be enriched by students’ presentations, the interaction between the students and the convenor, game play, the discussion of mandatory readings, and the possible intervention of external guests.

At the end of the module, students will have enough instruments and knowledge to pursue future career trajectories in the food regime or, more simply, to be conscious and critical consumers.
All the mandatory readings will be distributed if not accessible via the University library system.

• Understand the legal complexity of the global food regime
• Evaluate the multiple socio-economic implications of the food we consume everyday
• Understand the role that legal instruments have in shaping the geography and mechanisms of production and in allocating resources and bargaining power throughout the food chain
• Learning about the actors and venues of global food governance
• Engage with some of the most pressing issues related to food production, transportation, consumption and recycling
• Identify the weaknesses of the current global food regime and apply the theoretical tools to a concrete case study
• Present a legal argument in public
• Draft a legal brief on the basis of an existing issue

Classes will be a combination of lecturing and seminars. Interactive moments, moot-courts and other forms of teaching may be experimented.

BLOG POSTS: Starting from class 2, students will be asked to present and comment blogs and therefore be actively involved.

STUDENTS ATTENDING CLASSES ARE REQUIRED TO DO ALL THE MANDATORY READINGS AND TO BE READY TO COMMENT THEM WITH THE PROFESSOR AND THE COLLEAGUES. This will account for participation (up to 30% of the final mark)

ASSESSMENT FOR STUDENTS ATTENDING

ATTENDANCE

-          Attendance is not mandatory.

-          If attendance reaches the 80% of classes, it will be assessed together with participation. Participation accounts for 30% of the final mark

 

IN CLASS ASSESSMENT: 30%

-          During the course, each student will have to prepare one blog post of 600 words to be written (in English), shared with the rest of the class and presented in class. Depending on the number of students, the blog will be an individual or group effort. It will have to discuss a concrete situation connected with the content of class. Any visual or document support is allowed for the presentation.

-          Each student will also be required to provide the comment to one blog post.

 

FINAL ASSESSMENT: 40%

-          On the last day of class, will be asked to provide a 400/500 words answer to a question, in half an hour. Students will have the possibility to choose among three problems and three essay questions. Material will be allowed in class. Then, each student will have 10 minutes to discuss the content of the answer before the professor and the rest of the class. 40%

 

Further information will be provided on the first day of class

 

ASSESSMENT FOR STUDENTS NOT ATTENDING

4000 words essay to be sent via email before midnight of April 30th. On the first day of class, three titles will be indicated by the convener and shared with the students.

The module aims to provide masters students with a broad, in-depth and critical perspective on the link between multiple legal structures and a transnational food regime that produces almost 800 million undernourished people and more than 1 billion over-nourished and obese. Rather than being natural, the way in which food is produced, transported, allocated, consumed and discarded is strictly dependent on local and international legal structures and has consequences that go far beyond individual health. As the students will discover throughout the module, the act of eating, an operation which is often mechanically conducted and taken for granted (especially in some parts of the world, and by parts of society), is the final point of a complex system in which law interacts with economics, politics, culture, human rights, climate change and several other domains that are often overlooked in discussions about law and food.

The module is structured on the basis of eleven different ‘containers’ of three hours each, whose content will be enriched by the interaction between the students and the instructor, the discussion of mandatory readings and possible interventions of external experts.

Every week, students will have one hour in class to discuss, investigate and sharpen their analysis of a food-related issue which will then be the object of their final presentation and final legal report. In this way, students will also develop a practical understanding of the link between law and the food regime and the ability to utilize legal tools and concepts in real life situations. At the end of the module, students will have enough instruments and knowledge to pursue future career trajectories in the food regime or, more simply, to be conscious and critical consumers.

CALENDAR

The class meets between 27 March and 12 April

-          27-03 ore 16.00-19.00 aula D2

-          28-03 ore 16.00-19.00 aula LL4

-          29-03 ore 16.00-19.00 aula D2

-          30-03 ore 16.00-19.00 aula LL6

-          31/03 ore 16.00-19.00 aula D2

-          03-04 ore 16.00-19.00 aula D2

-          04-04 ore 16.00-19.00 aula LL4

-          05-04 ore 16.00-19.00 aula D2

-          06-04 ore 16.00-19.00 aula LL6

-          07/04 ore 16.00-19.00 aula D2

-          10-04 ore 16.00-19.00 aula D2

-          11-04 ore 16.00-19.00 aula LL4

-          12-04 ore 16.00-20.00 aula D2

 OBJECTIVES

The course aims to provide students with a broad, in-depth and critical perspective on the link between international economic law (trade and investments), national legal structures and the construction of a transnational food regime that produces almost 800 million undernourished people and more than 1 billion over-nourished and obese. Rather than being natural, the way in which food is produced, transported, allocated, consumed and discarded is strictly dependent on local and international legal structures. In addition, the current global food system has implications and produces consequences that go far beyond individual health and consumers’ rights.

As the students will discover throughout the course, the act of eating, an operation which is often mechanically conducted and taken for granted (especially in some parts of the world, and by parts of society), is the final point of a complex system in which law interacts with economics, politics, culture, human rights, climate change and several other domains that are often overlooked in discussions about law and food.

In order to achieve its goal, the course is structured on the basis of twelve different ‘containers’ of four three each, whose substance will be enriched by students’ presentations, the interaction between the students and the convenor, game play, the discussion of mandatory readings, and the possible intervention of external guests.

At the end of the module, students will have enough instruments and knowledge to pursue future career trajectories in the food regime or, more simply, to be conscious and critical consumers.
All the mandatory readings will be distributed if not accessible via the University library system.

 SYLLABUS

 PART I. INTRODUCTION: A FOOD SYSTEM CONSTRUCTED AROUND TRADE AND INVESTMENTS

Unit I – 27-03: Introduction and legal genealogy of the global food regime

Unit II – 28-03: Food and international trade – friends or foe?

Unit III – 29-03: Land and Food as the new playground for international investments

PART II. THE CONTEMPORARY CHALLENGES: WHAT ROLE FOR LAW?

Unit IV – 30-03: The Financialization of the Food System: Speculation and Financial integration

Unit V – 31-03: Concentration of Power, access to market and anti-competitive practices

Unit VI- 03-04: Regulatory Responses to Food Paradoxes: Obesity, Hunger and Waste

Unit VII – 04-04: Access to seeds: intellectual property rights and the future of food

Unit VIII – 05-04: Climate Change: Impacts, Responsibilities and Responses from and for the Agricultural Sector

PART III. FOOD SYSTEM AND GOVERNANCE

Unit IX – 06-04: Corporate Social Responsibility: Eat Fairly and Save the world?

Unit X –07-04: From Transnational Food Chains to Transnational Accountability

Unit XI – 10-04: Role Play

Unit XII – 11-04: Right to Food à Food Sovereignty à Food Justice à Food as a commons à what next and what role for local authorities?

 EXAM – 12-04

 

DETAILS OF CLASSES AND READINGS

 March 27, 16-19h Aula D2

Unit I: Introduction and legal genealogy of the global food regime: The introductory session will be combine lecturing, seminar-style teaching and improvisation, leaving the students free to elaborate, discuss, think about food and the multiple perspectives that we can adopt when we discuss about it. Students will be presented with the idea of food as the output of transnational chains of production and consumption, which cut across continents and countries, and that are often dominated by few actors. In particular, they will be asked to think and reason about the pros and cons of these networks, and to participate by commenting the readings.

The class will be articulated around the following moments.

• Introduction: people, course, assessment and participation
• Team game: divide the board into Law and Food and then pick words and ask them to think of where they would put them and why: malnutrition & overnutrition; land grabbing; subsidies; food aid; GMO; farmers; colonialism; financial market; forced labor; indigenous communities; climate change.
• The main challenges of the contemporary global food system
• How do we got here: a genealogy of food regimes

 

Readings

-          Raj Patel, Stuff and Starved, Introduction, (Portobello Books, 2007) 1-8

-          Mark Bittman, How to Feed the World, New York Times, October 14, 2013

-          Philip McMichael, Food Regimes and Agrarian Question, Chapter 2 (Fernwood Publishing, 2013) 21-40

-          Nadia Lambek and Cecilia Cley, Introduction, in Rethinking the Food System:Structural Challenges, New Strategies and the Law, (Springer, 2014) 1-26

 

Optional readings

-          Philip McMichael (2009) A food regime genealogy, The Journal of Peasant Studies, 36:1, 139-169

-          Herriett Friedmann, Distance and Durability: Shaky foundations of the global food regime, 13 Third World Quarterly 2, 1992

-          Thomas Prince, Distancing: Consumption and the severing of feedback, in Princen, Maniates and Conca, Confronting Consumption (MIT, 2002)

-          Herriett Friedmann, The Political Economy of Food, The New Lef Review, 1993

 

28 March, 16-19h Aula LL4

Unit II: Food and international trade – friends or foe? This session analyses the construction of the international trade regime around the notion of comparative advantage and free trade. In particular, attention will be paid to the World Bank's Structural Adjustment Projects and the different legal interventions defining the role for public subsidies to agriculture and food production. Subsequently, we will look at the ongoing process of regionalization of trade and its implications for food production, consumption and safety. Particular attention will be paid Free Trade Agreements, the Trans-Pacific Partnership, NAFTA and their food-related implications.

 

Readings:

-          Thomas J. Schoenbaum, Fashioning a New Regime for Agricultural Trade: New Issues and The Global Food Crisis, 3 Journal of International Economic Law 14, 593–611

-          Ghosh J., Why farming subsidies still distort advantages and cause food insecurity, The Guardian, 27 November 2013

-          Olivier De Schutter, Background document prepared by the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food on his mission to the World Trade Organization (WTO), presented to the Human Rights Council in March 2009 (background study to UN doc. A/HRC/10/005/Add.2)

-          Watch: TTIP – What the US-EU trade deal means for your food

 

Optional Readings:

 

WTO and Agriculture

-          Jennifer Clapp, WTO Agriculture Negotiations: implications for the Global South, Third World Quarterly, Vol. 27, No. 4, pp 563-577, 2006

-          Anderson, Kym and Ernesto Valenzuela, Do Global Trade Distortions Still Harm Developing Country Farmers”, Review of World Economics, 143 (2007) 108-139

-          Olivier de Schutter, The World Trade Organization and the Post-Global Food Crisis Agenda: Putting Food Security First in the International Food System, Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium, U.N. Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food.

-          Kim Burnett and Sophia Murphy, What Place for International Trade in Food Sovereignty?, paper presented at Food Sovereignty: A Critical Dialogue, Conference Paper #2, September 2013

-          Oxfam, Truth or consequences Why the EU and the USA must reform their subsidies, or pay the price, Oxfam International, 2005

-          P. Mehra, India's stand prevail in Bali, The Hindu, 4 December 2013

 

Regionalization and impact of FTA on agriculture and food production

-          Jeff Sistrunk, India Says Food Security 'Non­Negotiable' At WTO Summit, Law360.org, December 2013

-          Deborah James, Food Security, Farming, and the WTO and CAFTA, Global Exchanges (2013)

-          Karen Hansen-Kuhn, NAFTA at 20: State of the North American Farmer, December 20, 2013

 Wto and food safety rules

-          Alex Lawson, Food Safety Rules Squabbles Mounting At WTO Committee, Law360.org, July 2015

-          Matt Sharp, WTO Members Ding EU's Food Safety, Procurement Rules, 360.org, July 2015

 

29 March: 16-19h – Aula D2

Unit III: Land and Food as the new playground for international investments: this session looks at the link between International Investment Law (Bilateral Investment Treaties, investment agreements, and investment arbitration), Foreign Direct Investments and the construction of the global food regime. After an introduction of the key legal elements, the session will specifically focus on a) the modalities and consequences of large-scale land acquisitions and land concessions; b) the increasing role of financial actors as investors in the global food chain and the implications that this may have in terms of agricultural production, market directions and accountability. Arbitral awards and investment arbitration will also be analyzed from the point of view of public participation and their consequences in terms of national sovereignty and public interest.

 

Readings:

-          Michael Fakhri, book review of The Origins of International Investment Law: Empire, Environment, and the Safeguarding of Capital. By Kate Miles, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013, Book review, Journal of International Economic Law, 2015, 18, 697–708

-          Philip McMichael (2012) The land grab and corporate food regime restructuring, The Journal of Peasant Studies, 39:3-4

-          Christophe Golay & Irene Biglino (2013) Human Rights Responses to Land Grabbing: a right to food perspective, Third World Quarterly, 34:9, 1630-1650

-          Saturnino Borras Jr and Jennifer Franco, From Threat to Opportunity? Problems with the Idea of a ‘Code of Conduct’ for Land Grabbing, 13 Yale Human Rights and Development Journal 2 (2014)

 

Watching in class: Land Rush: http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/land­rush/

 

Optional Readings:

 

Origins of international investment law

-          Kate Miles, The Origins of International Investment Law Empire, Environment and the Safeguarding of Capital, Chapter 1, Origins of international investment law

 

Regulating Investments

-          Olivier De Schutter (2011) How not to think of land-grabbing: three critiques of large-scale investments in farmland, The Journal of Peasant Studies, 38:2, 249-279

-          Tomaso Ferrando, BITing Land Abroad: The anti-distributive impact of Bilateral Investment Treaties, 20 African Yearbook of International Law (2014),  249–287 (39)

-          La Via Campesina, The Nyeleni Declaration, 2007

-          Lea Brilmayer and William J. Moon, Regulating Land Grabs: Third Party States, Social Activism and International Law, in Lambek and Cley (eds), Rethinking the Food Systems (2014)

-          Philip McMichael (2013) Land Grabbing as Security Mercantilism in International Relations, Globalizations, 10:1, 47-64

-          Deininger, Klaus, Derek Byerlee, et al. (2011). Rising Global Interest in Farmland: Can it Yield Sustainable and Equitable Benefits? Agriculture and Rural Development. Washington, DC, World Bank

-          M. Borras Jr., Jennifer C. Franco, S. Ryan Isakson, Les Levidow & Pietje Vervest (2016) The rise of flex crops and commodities: implications for research, The Journal of Peasant Studies

 

30 March: 16-19h Aula LL6

Unit IV: The Financialization of the Food System: Speculation and Financial Integration: this session is dedicated to the increasing presence of financial actors and financial drivers in the definition of the global food system. If in the past it was only a matter of food speculation, as in the 2008/2009 price peak, today financial investors are operating throughout the chain, from land to delivery. Production, transformation and distribution of food have been identified as a fruitful areas for investments and this is significantly impacting the food system. From the legal perspective, this raises significant issues in terms of price and speculation, food security, right to food, and concentration of economic power. Through the use of concrete cases and the analysis of some attempts of legal and quasi-legal (CSR) intervention, students will have the opportunity to familiarize with this phenomenon and improve their understanding of the complexity of the food system.

 

Readings

-          Burch D. and G. Lawrence, 2009, ‘Towards a third food regime: behind the transformation’, 26 Agriculture and Human Values, 267–279

-          Luigi Russi, Hungry Capital, Ch 4, Commodity Speculation (2014)

-          SOMO (2011) Building a coalition against food speculation , SOMO, July 21, 2011 available

-          from https://www.somo.nl/building-a-coalition-against-food-speculation/ [last accessed

-          January 7, 2017]

-          Nelson J., 2015, Saskatchewan stops pension funds from buying farmland as prices rise, The

-          Globe and Mail, April 13

-          FAIRR, Factory Farming: Assessing Investment Risks, FAIRR, 2016

-          Moore J., 2016, Whole Foods Market Inc. (WFM) Stake Boosted by BlackRock Investment

-          Management LLC, The Cerbat Gem, 15 December, available from

-          https://www.thecerbatgem.com/2016/12/15/whole-foods-market-inc-wfm-stake-boosted-byblackrock-investment-management-llc.html

-

 

Optional Readings

-          Oane Visser, Ryan Isakson and Jennifer Clapp, Introduction to a Symposium on Global Finance and the Agri-food Sector: Risk and Regulation, Journal of Agrarian Change, 2015

-          Gerald Epstein, Introduction, in G. Esptein, Financialization and the World Economy, Edward Elgar Publishing, 2005

-          Jennifer Clapp, Financialization, distance and global food politics, The Journal of Peasant Studies, 2014

-          S. Ryan Isakson (2014): Food and finance: the financial transformation of agro-food supply chains, The Journal of Peasant Studies, 2015

-          Madeleine Fairbairn, ‘Like gold with yield’: evolving intersections between farmland and finance', Journal of Peasant Studies, January 2014

-          FAIRR, Investor Case Studies, Volume 2, FAIRR, 2016

-          Tomaso Ferrando, The Financialization of Land and Agriculture: Mechanisms, Implications and Responses, in Ioannis Loanis (ed) Food Chains and Competition Law (Oxford University Press, forthcoming 2017)

-          The Munden Project, The Financial Risks of Insecure Land Tenure: An Investment View, December 2012

 

31 March: 16-19h Aula D2

Unit V: 8: Concentration of Power, access to market and anti-competitive practices: compared to the traditional vision of importing and exporting countries, today’s production takes place in a multiplicity of spaces, so that each region can be at the same time importer and exporter or partial goods. Even in the case of food, processed aliments can be the combination of value adding processes that take place in different places, starting from the moment of the harvest (or slaughter) till the final consumption. In addition, the scenario is complicated by the increase role played by investments, mergers and acquisitions (M&A) and financial actors, so that chains of production become increasingly vertically integrated and horizontally concentrated. Among the most interesting cases there are the acquisition of Kraft by Philip Morris, Bayern purchases of Monsanto, and the increase presence of financial capital behind the expansion of retailers. All these new dynamics increase the pressure exercised on farmers, may transform the way in which food is produced, define new worldwide chains and limit the choice and power of consumers. However, the multiplication of spaces of production may also lead to the opening of new spaces of legal resistance.

 

Readings

-          Olivier De Schutter, Addressing Concentration in the Food Supply Chains, UN, Dec 2010

-          Ioannis Lianos and Claudio Lombardi, Superior Bargaining Power and the Global Food Value Chain. The Wuthering Heights of Holistic Competition Law?, January 2016, CLES Research Paper Series 1/2016

-          Du Pont in South Africa, South Africa Affirms Partnership of DuPont Pioneer and Pannar Seed

-          Christopher Barrett et al, Smallholder Participation in Contract Farming: Comparative Evidence from Five Countries, World Development Vol. 40, No. 4, pp. 715–730, 2012

 

Optional Readings

-          Olivier de Schutter, Power concentration and unfair trading practices in agricultural supply chains, report prepared by BASIC for Fair Trade Advocacy Office and Tradecraft (October 2014)

-          Food and Water Watch, 'Grocery Goliath: How Food Monopolies Impact Consumers', 2013

-          SOMO, Eyes on the price International supermarket buying groups in Europe, March 2017

 

Watching in class: Last Week Tonight, Contract Farming in Poultry industry, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9wHzt6gBgI

 

 

03 April: 16-19h Aula D2

Unit VI: Regulatory Responses to Food Paradoxes: Obesity, Hunger and Waste: this session engages with two of the most evident paradoxes of the global food regime: obesity and waste at the time of hunger and food poverty. On the one hand, we will be asking what role law may have in tackling a system that generates 800 million malnourished people, 1.2 billion obese and where more than 30% of the food produced is sent to landfill. In particular, we would focus on the role of fiscal regulation (soda tax) and on the rationale and long term implications of creating a legal and economic incentive towards redistribution of food waste to tackle food poverty. The focus will be specifically on the European Union and those Member States (in particular France and Italy) that have started looking at the possibility to use law in order to reduce food waste.

 

Readings

-          Sarah Conly, Introduction: The Argument, in Sarah Conly, Against Autonomy: Justifying Coercive Paternalism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012) pp. 1-15

-          Sarah Boeley, Mexico’s sugar tax leads to fall in consumption for second year running, The Guardian, 22 February 2017

-          Stephanie Kirchgaessner, Italy tackles food waste with law encouraging firms to donate food, The Guardian, 3 August 2016

-          Martin Caraher, Is It Appropriate to Use Surplus Food to Feed People in Hunger? Short-term Band-Aid to More Deep-Rooted Problems of Poverty, Food Research Collaboration (2017)

 

Optional Readings

-          Malden Nesheim and Marion Nestle, “The Internationalization of the Obesity Epidemic: The Case of Sugar Sweetened Sodas,” 2013

-          Sarah E. Clark and Corinna Hawkes, Exporting Obesity How U.S. farm and trade policy is transforming the Mexican food environment, 2012

-          Ben Richardson, Sugar Shift: Six Ideas for a Healthier and Fairer Food System, Food Research Collaboration

-          Elizabeth Dowler and Hannah Lambie-Mumford, Introduction: Hunger, Food and Social Policy in Austerity, 03 Social Policy and Society 14 (2015)

-          Tomaso Ferrando, Impolite Conversations around Food Waste, Critical Legal Thinking, April 2016

 

Watch

-          Watch: Marion Nestle, The International of the Obesity Epidemic: The Case of Sugar Taxhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-FvmgpOtis

-          Tristram Stuart, The Global Waste Scandal, TED intervention, http://www.ted.com/talks/tristram_stuart_the_global_food_waste_scandal.html

 

04 April: 16-19h Aula LL4

Unit VII: Access to Seeds: Intellectual Property Rights and the Future of Food:students are asked to read and discuss one of the most interesting aspect of the food-law relationship, i.e. the possibility to obtain private property rights (patents) on seeds and food. In particular, the session starts with a theoretical discussion of intellectual property as the right to privately own the nature. Then, with the use of legal precedents and case studies, it enters into the details of the role that IP law can play in redefining developing countries’ economies, food security, right to food and food sovereignty. Part of the class will be dedicated to an internal ‘moot-court’ performance where students will be divided into two groups, each of one supporting a position on GMOs as a solution to food hunger.

 

Readings:

-          Graham Dutfield, The Role of the International union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV), Intellectual Property Issue Paper No 9, Quaker United Nations Office, February 2011

-          The Starbucks/Ethiopian Coffee Saga: Geographical Indications as a Linchpin for Development in Developing Countries, Nordiska Afrikaninstitute, Policy Note, February 2008

-          Susan K. Sell, 'Corporations, Seeds, and Intellectual Property Rights Governance', in J.Clapp and D. Fuchs, Corporate Power in Global Agrifood Governance, The MIT Press, 2009

-          Anne Saab, Climate-Ready Seeds and Patent Rights: A Question of Climate (in) Justice?, 15 Global Jurist 2, 2015

 

Optional Readings

-          Vandana Shiva, The Stolen Harvest of Seeds, Ch 5 Stolen Harvest

-          Vandana Shiva, Genetic Engeneering and Food Security, Ch 6 Stolen Harvest

-          Jack Kloppenburgm, Repurposing the Master’s Tools: The Open Source seed Initiative and the Struggle for Seed Sovereignty. Conference paper #56. Proceedings of Food Sovereignty: A Critical Dialogue, International Conference, Yale University, New Haven, CT (Sept. 2013) 14-15

-          Kathleen McAfee, Selling nature to save it? Biodiversity and green developmentalism.” In: Environment and Planning: Society and Space 17 (2013) 133-154

-          La Via Campesina, Our Seeds Our Future, 2013

-          Martínez‐Alier, Joan. 1996. “The merchandising of biodiversity”. In: Capitalism Nature Socialism 7 (1): 37-54

-          The Oakland Institute, Down on the Seed: the World Bank Enables Corporate Takeovers of Seeds, San Francisco (2017)

 

Watch

-          Vandana Shiva, “The Future of Food and Seed,” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYwOTLopWIw

-          Mark Lynas Oxford Lecture 2013, https://vimeo.com/56745320

 

 

05 April: 16-19h Aula D2

Unit VIII: Climate Change: Impacts, Responsibilities and Responses from and for the Agricultural Sector: it is becoming increasingly clear that the global food system has a major impact on climate change. Fields are sprayed with fertiliser, animals are fed, produces are shipped throughout the continent and forest is transformed into agricultural land. The combined effects of all the stages of the food system mean that food and drink are the single largest source of greenhouse gas emissions from consumption by UK households. At the same time, small-scale farmers and agriculture in general are among the most affected by climate change and by the increase volatility in weather conditions. Despite this, while there are some efforts to make agriculture more resilient, there are very few plans to reduce the climate impact of the food we eat. In some cases, the link between food production (and especially meat production) and climate change are kept hidden. In this session, students learn more about the link between environmental degradation, climate change and the transformation of the food regime, along with some of the legal tools offered by the current WTO regulation.

 

Readings

-          FAO, Livestock’s Long Shadow, FAO, 2006, Chapters III, IV, VI

-          Oxfam, Hot and hungry – how to stop climate change derailing the fight against hunger

-          Christoph Schmitz et al, Trading More Food: Implications for Land Use, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, and the Food System” Global Environmental Change 22(1), 2012, 189–209

-          The Guardian, UN expert calls for tax on meat production, May 25, 2016

 

 

Optional readings

-          UNEP, Growing greenhouse gas emissions due to meat production, October 2012

-          FAO, Tackling Climate Change through Livestock: A Global Assessment of Emissions and Mitigation Opportunities, especially p.83 ss. 'Implications for Policy Making'.

-          Nicholas Mirzoeff, The Climate Crisis Is a Debt Crisis, South Atlantic Quarterly, Volume 112, Number 4: 831­838 (2013)

-          Olivier De Schutter, Trade in the Service of Sustainable Development, Conclusions (Oxford: Hart, 2015) 165-173

-          Rob Nixon, Intro, in Rob Nixon, Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2011)

-          Sara Nelson, The Slow Violence of Climate Change, Jacobin Magazine

 

 

06 April: 16-19h Aula LL6

Unit IX: Corporate Social Responsibility: Eat Fairly and Save the World: This section is dedicated to some of the most relevant forms of governance adopted in the food sector: multi-stakeholderism, eco-labelling, standards and certifications. On the one hand, Private-Private forms of organization and dialog are increasingly occupying a central role in defining what is produced, how it is produced, and how food security is addressed all over the world. On the other hand, green frogs, certificates and images are increasingly utilized by businesses to communicate extra-information about their products and are exponentially appearing on what we consume. However, do consumers really know what they are all about? Are we really informed and put in the condition of exercising our choice freely and autonomously? Are all certifications good or are they producing unexpected and/or negative consequences throughout the chain of production? Through the students' presentation, case studies and examples, students will be asked to critically discuss these questions and to think of whether a diffused and global system of private-public platforms of CSR has become an industry in itself that may require codes of conducts and discipline.

 

Readings

-          Tomaso Ferrando, Corporate Governance Through Certification Schemes and Eco-Labeling: the Value of Silence, Chapter for The Corporation: A Critical, Interdisciplinary Handbook (Cambridge University Press, 2017)

-          IOB Review, Riding the wave of sustainable commodity sourcing Review of the Sustainable Trade Initiative IDH 2008-2013, IOB and government of Netherlands (2015), Read Summary and conclusions only

-          Harris Gleckman, Multi-stakeholderism: a corporate push for a new form of global governance, TNI State of Power 2016

 

Optional Readings

-          Miet Maertens and Johan F.M. Swinnen Licos, Standards as Barriers and Catalysts for Trade and Poverty Reduction, Centre for Transition Economics & Department of Economics University of Leuven (KUL)

-          Nora McKeon, Are equity and sustainability a likely outcome when foxes and chickens share the same coop?

-          Critiquing the concept of multistakeholder governance of food security, Globalizations (forthcoming 2017)

-          FAO, Voluntary Guidelines to support the progressive realization of the right to adequate food in the context of national food security, FAO, Rome (2012)

-          Miet Maertens and Johan F.M. Swinnen Licos, Standards as Barriers and Catalysts for Trade and Poverty Reduction, Centre for Transition Economics & Department of Economics University of Leuven (KUL)

 

 

07 April: 16-19h Aula D2

Unit X: From Transnational Food Chains to Transnational Accountability: This section of the module moves the focus back to the global system of food production and consumption and presents the students with implications of the multiplication of legal and quasi-legal points of intervention that derives from the transnational nature of supply chain capitalism. Through the use of a concrete example, future lawyers, businessmen, experts in logistics and students interested in businesses' compliance with higher standards will thus discover that local operations, investments and conducts are not only influenced by national regulation and internal self-regulations. On the contrary, what happens at one level of the chain (violations of labour rights, human rights, etc) may also be redefined by actions, campaigns and decisions that affect different moments of the system of production. From this point of view, codes of conduct, OECD guidelines, standards introduced by the international financial institutions (World Bank, European Investment Bank), multistakeholder initiatives, ethical investment strategies, national courts, consumers' legislations, etc. are not individual elements that operate autonomously, but different pieces of a broad puzzle that is ready to be mapped and that could lead to the identification of the root causes of socio-economic injustices rather than to the simple cure of the symptoms

 

Readings

-          The IGLP Law and Global Production Working Group, The role of law in global value chains: a research manifesto, London Review of International Law, Volume 0, Issue 0 (2016) 1-23

-          Annie Kelly, Nestle’ Admits Slavery in Thailand while Fighting Child Labour Lawsuit in Ivory Coast, The Guardian, 1 February 2016

-          Nestle Responsible Sourcing Guideline (2013)

-          Lawrence Hurley, U.S. top court rejects Nestle bid to throw out child slavery suit, January 11, 2016

-          Tomaso Ferrando, Land Rights at the time of Global Production: Multi-territoriality and legal chockeholds, Journal of Business and Human Rights (forthcoming, 2017)

 

Optional Readings

-          RAN, The Human Cost of Conflict Palm Oil, RAN, ILRF and Oppuk (2016)

-          Isabelle Vagneron Guy Faure and Denis Loeillet, Is there a pilot in the chain? Identifying the key drivers of change in the fresh pineapple sector, Food Sciences (2009)

-          Gary Gereffi, John Humphrey and Timothy Sturgeon, The governance of global value chains, Review of International Political Economy 12:1 February 2005: 78–104

 

10 April: 16-19h Aula D2

Unit XI: Role Play on Standards and International Food Trade: the class will be joined by the students of the Master in Food Law and Finance of the International University College of Turin and by Professor Nicolas Perrone (Durham University) to conduct a role play on the theme of food standards and international trade. More information will be provided closer to the date.

 

In preparation

-          Olivier De Schutter, Labelling Schemes: Supporting Ethical Consumerism, in Olivier De Schutter, Trade in the Service of Sustainable Development (Oxford: Hart Publishing, 2015)

 

Case Law

-          Alex Lawson, Mexico's $472M Tuna Label Retaliation Bid Gets WTO Panel, Law360.org, June 2016

-          Alex Lawson, WTO Once Again Strikes Down US Meat Labeling Rules, Law360.org, October 20, 2014

 

11-April: 16-19 Aula LL4

Unit XII: Right to Food à Food Sovereignty à Food Justice à Food as a commons à what next?

In the last session of the course, students will be required to think about the future of the food system, from the local to the global, and discuss the possibility of transformation that reside with concepts like ‘right to food’, ‘food sovereignty’ and ‘food as a commons’. In particular, we will benefit of the experience of Turin, one of the first cities to have moved towards a Food Policy oriented by the notion and principles of the right to food, the Lombardia Region (that introduced the first law on the Right to Food within the EU) and the current project of IPES-Food for a Common Food Policy at the European Level.

 

Readings

 Right to Food

-          Jose Luis Vivero Pol, Claudio Schuftan, No right to food and nutrition in the SDGs: mistake or success?

-          Tomaso Ferrando and Roberto Sensi, What can we learn from the European Union’s first right to food law? British Medical Journal Blog, 20 January 2017

 

Food Sovereignty

-          B. Agawal, Food sovereignty, food security and democratic choice: critical contradictions, difficult conciliations, Journal of Peasant Studies, January 2014

 Local authorities

-          Maria Bottiglieri, The Turin Food Autonomy for a ‘Right to Food Oriented’ Urban Food Poliy,  in Maria Bottiglieri, Giacomo Pettenati and Alessia Toldo (eds) Toward the Turin Food Policy, FrancoAngeli (2016)

 Towards a Common Food Policy

-          Jose Luis Vivero Pol, What if food is considered a common good? The essential narrative for the food and nutrition transition

-          Olivier de Schutter and Carlo Petrini, Time to Put a Common Food Policy on the Menu, POLITICO, 2 February 2017

 

12 April: 16-20 Aula D2

Unit XIII: Exam

4000 words essay to be sent via email before midnight of April 30th. On the first day of class, three titles will be indicated by the convener and shared with the students.

This is a list of preliminary readings and documentaries. Students may want to scroll, skim through or watch some of the documentaries in order to get an overall sense of the complexity of the food system, the many challenges that characterize it and the main areas of legal interest. Each session has its own readings (mandatory and optional).

Olivier De Schutter, The Specter of Productivism and Food Democracy, Wisconsin Law Review (2014)

Nora McKeon, The New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition: A Coup for Corporate Capital?, TNI Agrarian Justice Program

Nora McKeon, Global Governance for World Food Security: A Scorecard Four Years After the Eruption  of the ‘Food Crisis’, Heirich Boll Stiftung

Philip McMichael, A Food Regime Genealogy, The Journal of Peasant Studies (2009) 139-169

Henry Bernstein, Agrarian Political Economy and Modern World Capitalism: the Contributions of Food Regime Analysis, The Journal of Peasant Studies (2016) 611-647

Philip McMichael, Commentary: Food Regime for Thought, The Journal of Peasant Studies (2016) 648-670

Vandana Shiva, The Stolen Harvest of Seed

Raj Patel, Stuffed and Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World Food System, Melville House Publishing (2007)

Eric Schlosser, Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal, Houghton Mifflin Company (2001)

Nadia Lambek, Priscilla Claeys, Adrienna Wong and Lea Brilmayer (eds), Rethinking Food Systems: Structural Challenges, New Strategies and the Law, Springer (2014)

Documentaries:

Fed Up, 2014, 

Immokalee Workers: a story of slavery and freedom

Food Inc.,