© Krzysztof Gorlach, Imre Kovách, 2006 All rights reserved Series editor: Mariann Kovács Key words: knowledge, rural development, rural sociology, sustainability, non-agriculture, food supply chain, local-market, culture economy, tradition, hand-craft ISBN 963 7372 33 4 ISSN 1788-1064 The CORASON Research Project (A cognitive approach to rural sustainable development – dynamics of expert and lay knowledges) was funded by the EU 6th Framework Programme www.corason.hu Published by the Political Science Institute of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences 1014 Budapest, Országház u. 30. Responsible for publishing: the Director of IPS HAS Cover design and layout: Mariann Kovács Contents Introduction ................................................................................................................................5 Local Food Production in the Czech Republic ...................................................................... 9 Eva Kucerova – Lukas Zagata 1. General information ............................................................................................................... 9 2. Case study ............................................................................................................................ 13 Local Food production and Knowledge Dynamics in Rural Sustainable Development. 24 Imre Kovách – Boldizsár Megyesi Socio-institutional and economical context ............................................................................. 25 Agriculture and food-industry.................................................................................................. 29 Case Study Analysis................................................................................................................. 32 Conclusion................................................................................................................................ 36 Local Food Production and Knowledge Dynamics in Rural Sustainable Development in Poland...................................................................................................................................... 38 Krzysztof Gorlach – Paweł Starosta – Andrzej Pilichowski – Tomasz Adamski – Krystyna Dzwonkowska 1. Area description ................................................................................................................... 38 2. Case studies description ....................................................................................................... 43 Conclusions .............................................................................................................................. 54 Non-agricultural economy in the Czech Republic .............................................................. 57 Eva Kučerová – Adéla Ševčíková 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 57 2. Context Analysis .................................................................................................................. 58 3. Presentation of cases ............................................................................................................ 65 4. Comparative Analysis of the presented cases and the concluding remarks......................... 69 3 Non-agricultural economies as a factor of rural sustainable development in Hungary.73 Imre Kovách – Luca Kristóf 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 73 2. Context Analysis .................................................................................................................. 74 3. Presentation of cases ............................................................................................................ 77 3. Comparative Analysis .......................................................................................................... 82 4. Conclusions .......................................................................................................................... 84 Non-agricultural Economy in Poland................................................................................... 85 Krzysztof Gorlach – Paweł Starosta – Andrzej Pilichowski – Tomasz Adamski – Krystyna Dzwonkowska 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 86 2. Context analysis ................................................................................................................... 87 3. Presentation of cases ............................................................................................................ 90 4. Conclusions .......................................................................................................................... 97 4 Local Food Production, Non-agricultural Economies and Knowledge Dynamics in the Rural Sustainable Development Introduction The volume presented below contains three chapters focusing on the issue of local food production and three chapters on the issue of non-agricultural economy prepared by three Central European teams, namely: the Hungarian, Czech and Polish ones as a part of the CORASON project. All of them try to address the problem of role of various types of knowledge used by different actors involved in the processes under consideration as well as the contribution of described cases into the process of rural sustainable development. They bring together various cases showing various kinds of agricultural product portrayed as a special kind of food that has been produced in the particular area and/or on the particular farm and therefore might be perceived as a local one. The Czech chapter focuses on the production of the “organic” meat. The idea to construct the quality of such a product seems to be a primary goal of the analysis contained in the paper. The “organic” character of the product has resulted not only from the style of breeding of the calves but also from the method of slaughtering as well as cooling, cutting and packing process. Therefore such an analysis might be treated as an example showing the social character of the construction of the so-called “bio-product” (an organic one). Since it has been almost entirely the social process it has been also quite interesting to find some ways of omitting established rules. However, on the other hand the role of cooperation among various actors has been underlined pointing out at the success of the whole network “(…) because it reveals at proper time points and proper places its parts” (Czech paper, p. 11). Quite contrary the Hungarian chapter provides us with three different stories. The first one shows the identification of local food with the particular producer performing at the particular territory. The production of meat seems not to be so different from conventional producers, however, the agreement between the large farm and the relatively small slaughter house gives the product its “local” label. In fact, the farm has been identified as the Nature and Gene Conservation Public Company, but this particular characteristic seems to have a minor impact on the “locality” of the product. Just an opposite has to be mentioned in the second Hungarian case of the family farm that has been known as an organic one using also biodynamic methods. It is not only the case of agricultural production but the involvement in further parts of the food chain as well. As it has been stressed in the Hungarian chapter (p12): “They are using traditional Transylvanian recipes for their ready made food products”. Such a product might be found in the largest supermarkets in Hungary. The third Hungarian case, however, provides us with a slightly different, but a much more complex story from the wheat growing area of Mezőtúr. One can identify here the direct involvement of various actors. Two of them sell local products (wheat, flour) for distant consumers. The first one, the investigated farming family raises wheat, barley, sunflower seeds and corn and sells them to consumers and buyers outside the region. As it has been pointed out: “(…) they do not know what happens to the products they are producing” (Hungarian chapter, p. 15). The second actor has been of a very different character. The ABOMILL company purchases wheat from farmers in 5 the area under strict requirement for the quality of the product and again sells the flour made of the regional wheat in the region as well as outside it. The other actors in the case seem to act according to the scheme of local producers for local consumers. A baker and a confectionary owner sell their products for local consumers. However, both of them do not pay much attention to “the locality” of their products. They might be treated as examples of conventional local producers approaching mainly local customers with various products, using some foreign names for the offered ones. Finally, the Polish chapter brings two entirely different cases. The first one focuses on the traditional sheep cheese from the Podhale sub-region in the Southern region of Małopolska. The cheese called “oscypek” has a long and quite well established culinary tradition in the region as well as in some other parts of Poland. Quite interestingly, in the research conducted by the Polish team, its presence has been identified in three different networks, namely: “oscypek as a souvenir for the mass tourism”; “oscypek as a conqueror of the food market”, “neo-traditional oscypek