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Seed exchange networks and food system resilience in the United States

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  • Nurcan Helicke

Abstract

Seed exchange is a multidimensional issue with social, political, economic, and agricultural implications. There is a growing concern about the increase of the food system’s vulnerability as a result of loss of agricultural biodiversity. Farmers’ ability to replant, exchange, and distribute saved seed is a way to minimize their dependence on commercial suppliers and thereby maintain control over farming practices. Seed saving is also crucial for conservation because the process of choosing, replanting, and exchanging seeds relies on and increases diversity on the farm and in communities. Seed exchange networks, formal and informal ways that farmers engage alongside institutional plant breeding systems, help to conserve agricultural, social, and cultural diversity and identity as well as enhance resilience against environmental and economic shocks. However, how to build resilient seed systems and move from the innovative but relatively isolated project activities of professionals and farmers to a situation where such approaches are scaled up and networked alongside formal and informal, national and international plant breeding mechanism are a concern. This paper examines grassroots seed exchange through seed libraries, the marketing of new varieties through seed companies, and hybrid civil society-business models to understand their financial and technical abilities as well as challenges they face. Seed exchange networks fulfill an important role in conservation of agricultural biodiversity and building community resilience through their work on breeding, exchange, and propagation of regionally adapted open-pollinated seeds as well as advocacy on seed sovereignty and education on seed saving. Copyright AESS 2015

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  • Nurcan Helicke, 2015. "Seed exchange networks and food system resilience in the United States," Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences, Springer;Association of Environmental Studies and Sciences, vol. 5(4), pages 636-649, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:jenvss:v:5:y:2015:i:4:p:636-649
    DOI: 10.1007/s13412-015-0346-5
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    1. Janet MacFall & Joanna Lelekacs & Todd LeVasseur & Steve Moore & Jennifer Walker, 2015. "Toward resilient food systems through increased agricultural diversity and local sourcing in the Carolinas," Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences, Springer;Association of Environmental Studies and Sciences, vol. 5(4), pages 608-622, December.
    2. Nurcan Atalan-Helicke & Becky Mansfield, 2012. "Seed Governance at the Intersection of Multiple Global and Nation-State Priorities: Modernizing Seeds in Turkey," Global Environmental Politics, MIT Press, vol. 12(4), pages 125-146, November.
    3. Laura Lengnick, 2015. "The vulnerability of the US food system to climate change," Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences, Springer;Association of Environmental Studies and Sciences, vol. 5(3), pages 348-361, September.
    4. Calvet-Mir, Laura & Gómez-Baggethun, Erik & Reyes-García, Victoria, 2012. "Beyond food production: Ecosystem services provided by home gardens. A case study in Vall Fosca, Catalan Pyrenees, Northeastern Spain," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 153-160.
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    1. Ciska Ulug & Elen-Maarja Trell & Lummina Horlings, 2021. "Ecovillage foodscapes: zooming in and out of sustainable food practices," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 38(4), pages 1041-1059, December.
    2. Natalie G. Mueller & Andrew Flachs, 2022. "Domestication, crop breeding, and genetic modification are fundamentally different processes: implications for seed sovereignty and agrobiodiversity," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 39(1), pages 455-472, March.
    3. Isbell, Carina & Tobin, Daniel & Reynolds, Travis, 2021. "Motivations for maintaining crop diversity: Evidence from Vermont's seed systems," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 189(C).
    4. Ola Tveitereid Westengen & Kristine Skarbø & Teshome Hunduma Mulesa & Trygve Berg, 2018. "Access to genes: linkages between genebanks and farmers’ seed systems," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 10(1), pages 9-25, February.
    5. Gerald Marten & Nurcan Atalan-Helicke, 2015. "Introduction to the Symposium on American Food Resilience (Part 2)," Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences, Springer;Association of Environmental Studies and Sciences, vol. 5(4), pages 537-542, December.
    6. Yingjie Song & Qiong Fang & Devra Jarvis & Keyu Bai & Dongmei Liu & Jinchao Feng & Chunlin Long, 2019. "Network Analysis of Seed Flow, a Traditional Method for Conserving Tartary Buckwheat ( Fagopyrum tataricum ) Landraces in Liangshan, Southwest China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(16), pages 1-14, August.
    7. Soleri, Daniela & Kleinman, Nathaniel & Newburn, Rebecca, 2021. "Community Seed Groups: Biological and Especially Social Investigations Can Support Crisis Response Capacity," SocArXiv swv47, Center for Open Science.
    8. Daniela Soleri, 2018. "Civic seeds: new institutions for seed systems and communities—a 2016 survey of California seed libraries," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 35(2), pages 331-347, June.
    9. Gerald Marten & Nurcan Atalan-Helicke, 2015. "Introduction to the Symposium on American Food Resilience," Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences, Springer;Association of Environmental Studies and Sciences, vol. 5(3), pages 308-320, September.
    10. Labeyrie, Vanesse & Friedman, Rachel S. & Donnet, Sophie & Faye, Ndeye Fatou & Cobelli, Océane & Baggio, Jacopo & Felipe-Lucia, María R. & Raimond, Christine, 2023. "Linking seed networks and crop diversity contributions to people: A case study in small-scale farming systems in Sahelian Senegal," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 211(C).

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