Developments go fast: there is a growing interest among people living in urban environments in the origin of our daily food and in the development of short, recognizable sustainable food chains. Moreover, we see a growing number of local initiatives of local food production in urbanized areas. Besides local food production for consumption, the focus of these initiatives is on the effects of growing local food on health aspects, social cohesion and education. Although urban food production is growing both in the North and the South, drivers for this differ. With a loss of connection between consumption and production being one of the important drivers in the North, and the direct access to fresh healthy food being an important driver in the South.

Based on these developments, the focus of the second conference on Agriculture in an Urbanizing Society has shifted towards Reconnecting Agriculture and Food Chains to Societal Needs.

Research on this topic demands a multidisciplinary approach. Hence this conference aims to advance the scientific state of the art in research on multifunctional agriculture, local food chains and urban-rural relations by bringing together scholars from a wide range of disciplines (sociology, economics, spatial planning, land-use planning, regional planning, urban planning, crop sciences, animal sciences, soil sciences, architecture, etc.) from many parts of the world.

Visit the website for more information on the programme, venue and organization.

Call for abstracts opened: abstracts can be submitted until March 31, 2015.