Nigel Curry's presentation at the CCRI seminar Series of 16 January 2014 looking at Innovation and the source of previous knowledges and practices as a basis for this, including results from ESRC funded Grey and Pleasant Land project and EU FP7 funded SOLINSA project.

1. INNOVATING FROM
THE PAST
Nigel Curry 16.1.2014
“We’re trying to create an integrated approach
to food. It would have perhaps been like that
50 or 60 years ago when people were much
more aware of where their food came from:
their back garden, their allotments or from
local farmers. So we’re not innovative in that
sense, but we are innovative in trying to do
this again now” (Brighton and Hove 2013)

2. Structure
• Innovation and Policy
• Technical, economic and social
innovation
• Innovation theory
• Innovating from the past:
Empirical evidence
• Learning from the past

3. Innovation and its
importance in European
food policy
• Innovation is a central tenet in European policy
• EUROPE 2020 Strategy: innovation is indispensable
for food security and sustainable agriculture
• European Innovation Partnership (EIP) from 2014,
"aims to foster a competitive and sustainable
agriculture and forestry that 'achieves more for less'
and works in harmony with the environment"
(European Commission, 2012, page 4).
• Its relevance to food is central as the Common
Agricultural Policy continues to claim the largest
policy budget share within the European Union
• Echoed in UK reports

4. The paradox of
innovation and the CAP
• Much research shows that huge
amounts of public support in agriculture
stifle innovation.
• Income from subsidies independent of
efficiency and effectiveness reduces
impetus to innovate.
• So, we spend a lot of European funds
on one public policy (CAP) that has the
direct effect of thwarting another policy
– Innovation.

5. What is innovation?
Technical and economic
• Many definitions, but: the conversion of ideas,
practices and/or knowledge into benefits.
• Can be new or old ideas, fleeting (Concorde,
C5, space) or cumulative
• Can be producer (linear) or consumer-led
(non-linear)
• Technical and economic innovation dominate
literature and policy, but these tend to ignore
social context. ‘Grassroots’ innovation can be
socially or community led too, considering
localness, ethics and equity

6. Social innovation
• Social innovation is of increasing interest
and commonly observed in local food
innovation as a social movement
• No agreed universal definition and context
dependent, but: changes in social practice
to bring about positive net social
improvement.
• Attitude changes lead to behaviour changes
and new social movements
• Invariably acknowledges social networks,
localness and resilience
• Built around skills and knowledge

7. Innovation theory
• Innovation is about transition:
transition is temporal and non-linear.
• One theory set concentrates on new
innovations as they unfold (novelties,
futures)
• Another examines path dependency
• Less common is consideration is
innovation from ‘ex-practice’ and
‘forgotten’ practice (Shove, 2010).
• Innovation may be iterative: it plays
with the past as a foundation.

8. Empirical 1 - Localism
In relation to local food: evidence from two projects:
SOLINSA (BHFP) (current local food innovation) and
Grey and Pleasant Land (GPL)? (reflecting on the past
especially the depression and the Second War)
•BHFP: contemporary innovation: local food in shops,
restaurants and state catering. Non-monetary
exchange, local food production
•GPL: local food (lack of transport) and distinctive
(fish on coast). Much non-monetary exchange
“My uncle Alec kept three chickens in the back yard
and they would produce at least one egg a day. When
there was more than one he would give the extra
away to someone who was ill”.

9. Empirical 2 - access to
land
• BHFP – more direct access to the soil
to make food part of people’s lives as
social innovation (allotments, urban
grazing, 200 local food growing
groups)
• GPL – back gardens, local allotments,
many people had an agricultural
heritage.

10. Empirical 3 – all parts
of the food chain
• BHFP – from food production to local food
processing and consumption
• GPL - “We used to preserve lots of things in Kilner
jars …. a messy job. And eggs, we always used to
put eggs ‘down’ in water glasses, they were called,
in big stone jars. We had them to use later on – at
least for a few weeks”.
“We would wrap up apples in newspapers and put
them in boxes in the loft and they would last a long
time, especially a good cooking apple would last
until the next season so you’d have them all the
year round”.

11. Empirical 4 – production
• BHFP – Urban open space production,
urban sheep grazing, public orchards –
community cohesion - innovation was
discussed in social terms:
“If you are going to plant a tree, in a
public space, why can’t it be a fruit
tree?”
• GPL – very similar ‘sharing’ of produce
produced in public allotments and
exchanges from one garden to another.

12. Conclusions: learning
from the past
• Innovating from the past is not just
indiscriminate nostalgia. Its
relevance is threefold
• Adopting: “getting back to our roots”
a sense of belonging and community
commitment
BHFP: “Yes, it is interesting. In many
ways it is about rekindling our
forgotten past”

13. Adapting: “We do learn a lot from
the past but there is a keenness for the
‘new’ food movement not to be seen to be
Luddite. Certainly, the learning and the
values of the new movements are different
now than they were then.”
Avoiding: “In the War, we used to have to
queue for things. If you were in the town
one day and somebody said “oh they’ve got
tomatoes up at the fruit stall”, well,
everybody made such a dash, you know, to
get in the queue for a few tomatoes, but
where they came from I can’t remember”