Small farms’ strategies between self-provision and socio-economic integration: effects on food system capacity to provide food and nutrition security

Small farms’ contribution to food and nutrition security (FNS) is widely acknowledged; however, the diversity of context-specific characteristics of small farms is still barely documented in terms of farm strategies and household dynamics. The paper analyses this contribution in connection with the strategies related to the destination of the produce, with specific attention to the balance between food self-provisioning and economic integration. The analysis of self-provisioning relies on the assumptions that (i) production and consumption decisions cannot be analysed separately when they are attributed to the same entity and that (ii) family farm strategic choices are influenced by both business outcomes and household’’s welfare. The analysis of economic integration hinges on Polanyi’’s categories of market, reciprocity and redistribution as the three main modes of economic integration of a farm within its environment. We have collected information from a range of farmers in the Lucca province (northern Tuscany, Italy) and key stakeholders, through interviews, focus groups and field visits. The results of our analysis highlight the different ways small farms’ contribution to FNS in relation to each mode of economic integration adopted by the small farms. The different forms of this contribution can be identified at two levels: (i) internal to the farming household and (ii) external (i.e. referred to the community and broader society). A concept of food quality encompassing local sustainability, cultural heritage and social cohesion, is crucial to valorise, through appropriate policies, the specificities of small farms’ contribution to FNS.