the territory
The “Piana del Cibo” is the first intermunicipal food policy (IFP) in Italy. The area of the Plain of Lucca (within the province of Lucca, in the Tuscany region) encompasses both rural and urban areas and owns a well-defined historical, cultural, and landscape identity. Five out of seven municipalities in the area – very heterogeneous municipalities in terms of dimension, geographical features, and demographics – participate in the IFP, to reach out beyond their administrative and functional boundaries and carry out food-related policies in a joint manner. The process which led to the IFP started in 2018 with the signature of the MUFPP, followed by a participatory project called “CIRCULARIFOOD”, which involved about 300 different actors into the definition of the IFP Strategy approved by the five City Councils.
The IFP is formalised as a joint management of food policy functions (in Italy a specific policy instrument called “gestione associate delle funzioni”), combined with an elaborate, ad hoc structure of participatory governance. The IFP did not occur in a vacuum: food issues have been occupying civil society space in the Plain of Lucca since many years (Arcuri et al 2022) and well-established networks were already operating in diverse initiatives of short food supply chains, food sovereignty, urban agriculture, food poverty, and heritage foods
Case study referee
Sabrina Arcuri
Other participants
Francesca Galli
sabrina.arcuri@agr.unipi.it
Territorial food system
Type of region : Urban areas
Approximate size and population
160 000 inh (Plain of Lucca); 430 km².
Annual population growth rate is negative in the Province of Lucca (migration inflows partly compensate for natural negative growth rate).
Type of agriculture
Prevalence of small-medium farms (<5 ha; 5-10 ha); limited number of large farms (>59 ha) but they manage 31% of UAA in the Plain of Lucca (Source: Galli et al, forthcoming).
Vegetables and cereals; wine and olive oil prevalent on the hills; fodder production (but lack of a corresponding livestock chain).
Short circuits (and anteriority)
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Main social issues
8.5% of individuals were living in relative poverty in Tuscany, compared to 13.5% national feature in 2020. No data available at the Province level (Source: ISTAT).
Unequal access to good food; urban sprawl; unequal access to land.
Presence of agroecologial systems
Low prevalence of OA: 5% of UAA is organic and additional 4% in conversion (Source: Galli et al).
Attention paid to local varieties (links to traditional recipes)
Specific agri-food system dynamics and initiatives (and anteriority)
Alternative food networks initiatives (8 farmers’ markets, Solidarity Purchase Groups-GAS); online platforms for selling local produce.
Agrifood transition
Main stakes for the transition : Urban sprawl and soil sealing, loss of ecosystem services / Social inclusion; access to adequate and heathy nutrition for all / Promotion of the local agri-food system; opportunities for young farmers
Key obstacles to AE transition
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Leading actors in the transition
Municipal authorities (admin + politics); Several coops; catering industries; social farms; Researchers at University of Pisa and Florence; Laboratorio Sismondi; groups of farmers, CSOs (civil society organisations); Private citizens.
Institutionalisation of the agrifood transition
Local (municipal and inter-municipal)
Key initiatives
3 innovative initiatives
You will find here 3 original initiatives, among all those which allowed the transition of the territorial agri-food system and appear on the frieze-trajectory detailed below.
Calafata social coop and Conserve
Agriculture coop carrying out social farming activities. Involvement and training of vulnerable individuals, food waste prevention through the project “ConServe”, and recovery of abandoned land in the peri-urban area of Lucca. Caritas affiliated.
Trajectory
Method
The methodology is twofold: in the food policy case, it has been inspired by the action-research approach used in the HEU project FoodCLIC, combined with additional research through a service-learning exercise involving master students enrolled in the academic course of ‘Wine marketing’ at the Department of Agriculture, Food and Environment of the University of Pisa.
Detailed timeline
The detailed timeline (1970-2023) shows key elements of the global context, public policies and initiatives launched by diverse organisations and networks involved in agricultural development, valorisation of products and food access.
The Plain of Lucca involves six municipalities: the city of Lucca (the capital city of the province), Altopascio, Capannori, Montecarlo, Porcari and Villa Basilica. Despite the name as if it is a single area, it cannot be considered as an administrative unit. The Plain is home to over 169,000 residents, contributing to the province’s total population of 381,980. The region faces several challenges, including hydraulic fragility due to the complex management of the Serchio River’s water and susceptibility to landslides owing to soil instability.
The distinguishing feature of the Plain lies in its unique cultural identity, separate from the typical Tuscan imagery detached from the echoes of Renaissance grandeur. The economy in the area is very flourishing, and the most important sector is the tertiary one, thanks to tourism, the cultural type but also linked to food tradition (food and wine especially), even after the slowdown caused by COVID-19.
This area is very famous for the wine production, which is central in the economy. Both the PDOs (Protected Designation of Origin) Colline Lucchesi and Montecarlo, and the PGIs (Protected Geographical Indications) Toscana and Costa Toscana, belong to this area. Even if Lucca Plain’s soil is suitable for viticulture, during the 60s a decline in the agricultural sector happened, and then, in more recent years, the attention towards this sector increases a lot again. One of the reasons that was an obstacle to the growth in this sector was land fragmentation and the lack of instruments to overcome the issues created by this problem.
A first identified period concerns modernization between the 1970s and 1990s on a national scale. On a local scale, Slow Food, strongly present in the territory, established different convivia in the Plain of Lucca Presidium. This process of valorizing local agricultural production continues and strengthens from the 1990s onwards. By the 2010s, initiatives in this regard proliferate even further, with the establishment of initiatives like SlowBeans, which valorizes legume production in the territory (and nationally later on). Other Slow Food presidia are established, and various projects in partnership with research are developed (CIRCULARIFOOD, FoodCLIC). The products of the Slow Food Presidium are also sold at farmers’ markets, such as the Earth Market network, which is composed of groups of small farmers and producers that directly sell their products (Lucca Mercoledibio, which is a small market that involves 18 producers). Moreover, there are other kinds of bottom-up initiatives also to promote local distinctiveness, for example, the creation of Solidarity Purchasing Groups or the Wine and Oil Route of Lucca, Montecarlo and Versilia, which attracts many tourists who want to discover the local products and the food tradition of this area.
The Plain of Food (Piana del Cibo) is the result of the efforts of public authorities, education, food movements, CSOs, food businesses and farms to increase awareness about the importance of building an innovative food system that is sustainable and healthy from a holistic perspective.
The project Orti in Condotta involves more or less 500 schools and school gardens all around Italy, and two of them are also located in Capannori and Lucca. Its aim is also part of a regional government initiative to increase the knowledge about agriculture and food production, and also to reach the goal of creating 100.000 vegetable gardens in Italy.
Also, some political agreements have been signed about the importance of having a local food policy, for example, the MUFPP (Milan Urban Food Policy Pact) which is an international agreement that counts 250 mayors as signatories, or CIRCULARIFOOD. The second one started in 2019 and is a participatory project whose aim is to advocate for an inter-municipal food policy in Italy. The bases for this regulation are shared values, objectives, and the need for a sustainable food system. The participatory model also involves the creation of some dedicated bodies that make the structure work efficiently. The Agorà, which is an open assembly, the Food Council –mediates the between the Agorà and the decision-making body, and the Assembly of Mayors – the political body composed of the local authorities that take the decisions. In 2020 a common food policy commitment has been signed by five municipalities; this is a specific form of inter-municipal cooperation under Italian legislation.