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The alternative food movement in Japan: Challenges, limits, and resilience of the teikei system

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  • Kazumi Kondoh

Abstract

The teikei movement is a Japanese version of the alternative food movement, which emerged around the late 1960s and early 1970s. Similar to now well-known Community Supported Agriculture, it is a farmer-consumer partnership that involves direct exchanges of organic foods. It also aims to build a community that coexists with the natural environment through mutually supportive relationships between farmers and consumers. This article examined the history of the teikei movement. The movement began as a reaction to negative impacts of mechanized and chemically intensive agriculture promoted by the Japanese government. The movement experienced a rapid expansion in the early 1980s, and then gradually declined thereafter. The organic market expansion and certification system intersected with both cultural and gender role changes, impacting the teikei movement negatively. Consequently, the membership of teikei consumer groups has shrunk. Furthermore, the March 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant accident caused unprece dented damage to organic farmers in the affected regions. Despite the scientific uncertain about the safety level of radiation exposure, the organic farmers and the teikei consumer groups managed the situation and found a way to inspect radiation contamination. They did so with the support by networking with other teikei-related actors. This response to the nuclear power plant accident suggests that although the level of embeddedness presumably varies among teikei actors, ethics guided by the teikei principles are effective in forging a resilient partnership between farmers and consumers and in keeping the teikei system alive as an agent for social change. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015

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  • Kazumi Kondoh, 2015. "The alternative food movement in Japan: Challenges, limits, and resilience of the teikei system," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 32(1), pages 143-153, March.
  • Handle: RePEc:spr:agrhuv:v:32:y:2015:i:1:p:143-153
    DOI: 10.1007/s10460-014-9539-x
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Daniel Jaffee & Philip Howard, 2010. "Corporate cooptation of organic and fair trade standards," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 27(4), pages 387-399, December.
    2. Henning Best, 2008. "Organic agriculture and the conventionalization hypothesis: A case study from West Germany," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 25(1), pages 95-106, January.
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    Cited by:

    1. Marit Rosol & Ricardo Barbosa, 2021. "Moving beyond direct marketing with new mediated models: evolution of or departure from alternative food networks?," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 38(4), pages 1021-1039, December.
    2. Martina Bianca Fuhrmann-Aoyagi & Kenji Miura & Kazuo Watanabe, 2024. "Sustainability in Japan’s Agriculture: An Analysis of Current Approaches," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(2), pages 1-26, January.
    3. Antonella Samoggia & Chiara Perazzolo & Piroska Kocsis & Margherita Del Prete, 2019. "Community Supported Agriculture Farmers’ Perceptions of Management Benefits and Drawbacks," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(12), pages 1-21, June.
    4. Junko Kimura & Cyrille Rigolot, 2021. "The Potential of Geographical Indications (GI) to Enhance Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in Japan: Overview and Insights from Japan GI Mishima Potato," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(2), pages 1-12, January.
    5. Christina Gugerell & Takeshi Sato & Christine Hvitsand & Daichi Toriyama & Nobuhiro Suzuki & Marianne Penker, 2021. "Know the Farmer That Feeds You: A Cross-Country Analysis of Spatial-Relational Proximities and the Attractiveness of Community Supported Agriculture," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 11(10), pages 1-20, October.
    6. Kazakova-Mateva, Yanka & Radeva-Decheva, Donka, 2015. "The role of agroecosystems diversity towards sustainability of agricultural systems," 147th Seminar, October 7-8, 2015, Sofia, Bulgaria 212250, European Association of Agricultural Economists.
    7. Felix Zoll & Caitlin K. Kirby & Kathrin Specht & Rosemarie Siebert, 2023. "Exploring member trust in German community-supported agriculture: a multiple regression analysis," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 40(2), pages 709-724, June.
    8. Laura A. Carlson & Vera Bitsch, 2019. "Applicability of Transaction Cost Economics to Understanding Organizational Structures in Solidarity-Based Food Systems in Germany," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(4), pages 1-19, February.
    9. Haiying Tang & Ying Liu & Guoqin Huang, 2019. "Current Status and Development Strategy for Community-Supported Agriculture (CSA) in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(11), pages 1-15, May.
    10. Meiling Wu, 2024. "Conventionalization of Alternative Agriculture and the Intervention of External Investors: Case Sharing Community-Supported Agriculture Farm, China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(12), pages 1-11, June.

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