POLLEN Conference 2024

Roundtable discussion on​ “Global resource governance and agrarian labour (re)production”​

Roundtable 28: Parallel session 8 – 12 June, 2024, 13.00-14.30 ​

Brief:
Dynamics of labour and work are gathering increasing attention in the political ecology scholarship on contemporary global supply chains. While industrialized labour regimes have been a central research focus in sociology and political economy, agrarian forms of work are mostly addressed as a matter of political and humanitarian concern: think for instance of the debate on modern forms of ‘slavery’ in agrifood, fishing regimes, and ‘dirty’ gold. Although international legislation and policies are gathering pace to address these concerns through industry led, third party standards and trade regulations, little is known about the way these interventions also deeply transform supply chains configurations and labour dynamics on the ground. Even less research is devoted to the contextual comparison of different agrarian working conditions across the land and the seas. This roundtable considers some key questions about the ways in which current crises of labour and labour reproduction manifest in different parts of the world across Europe, S.E. Asia, West Africa and Latin America, and across different commodities - fish, gold, and tomatoes. We will discuss how the current efforts of resource supply chain governance across these agrarian contexts land on the ground and reconfigure labour dynamics and reproduction in these contexts.  

Panelists:

Diana Vela Almeida, Utrecht University (moderator) ​

Muriel Côte, Lund University​

Timothy Raeymaekers, University of Bologna​

Vanessa Jaiteh, University of Bern​

Alin Kadfak, Swedish University of Agricultural Science

Our presentation from the conference is available here