Krakow conversations on food security - conversation with SFSC4foodsec partners
- martaserafin
- 17 sie
- 6 minut(y) czytania
Zaktualizowano: 15 wrz
The need to transform contemporary industrial food systems toward greater sustainability and resilience is generating interest in understanding better the potential of Short Food Supply Chains (SFSCs) for contributing to that change.
Responding to this challenge was the motivation and context for establishing the SFSC4Foodsec network. With seed funding from the Swedish Institute, project partners from across the Baltic region initiated exploratory research on the potential of mainstreaming SFSC. The project partners are:
Swedish Agricultural University (SLU) Sweden,
IsoTech, Poland,
Rural Development Forum, Latvia,
Vytautas Magnus University (VMU), Lithuania, and
Civil Society Institute, Ukraine.
Each of the project partners prepared an SFSC needs analysis from the perspective of their country. The point of departure for the review in each country was the EU definition of what constitutes an SFSC. Country review were structured around 4 questions:
What is the current situation with respect to SFSC?
What is the desired or ideal situation?
How to move from the current to the ideal situation?
Who needs to do what? When? And with what resources?
The in-country needs analyses are provided here:
An overview is provided in what follows:
At the national level, policy fragmentation emerges as a persistent challenge across the region. Lithuania, Latvia and Poland have made progress in integrating SFSCs into their agricultural policy frameworks, through initiatives like Lithuania's school feeding programs and Poland's 2017 agricultural retail reforms. Yet CAP policies and programmes persist in favouring export-oriented agri-business. Ukraine's SFSC development remains constrained by the absence of dedicated policies, confining small producers to informal markets.
Even in more advanced systems like Sweden's, where sustainability agendas are well-established, SFSCs compete unsuccessfully with industrial farming for CAP allocations. This policy dissonance creates an uneven playing field that particularly disadvantages small-scale producers attempting to establish non-industrial scale production and prosumer distribution channels.
A summary of the barriers and bridges to SFSC mainstreaming across the 5 participating countries identified in terms of policy & governance, market structure, infrastructure & logistics, consumer engagement, funding & investment and cross-border collaboration is provided below.
Category | Barriers | Bridges |
Policy & Governance | · Fragmented national policies (e.g., weak SFSC integration in CAP plans). · Regulatory hurdles for small producers (e.g., food safety rules). · Lack of cross-border coordination. | · Lithuania’s B2G public procurement model (school meals). · Poland’s 2017 Agricultural Retail Act simplifying direct sales. · CORENET pan-european networks of SFSC advisors. |
Market Structures | · Dominance of large retailers (e.g., 70% market share in Lithuania/Poland). · Price competition disadvantaging small producers. · Informal markets in Ukraine lacking traceability. | · Ukraine’s craft food platforms (e.g., Craftmarket.shop). · Poland’s APPETIT digital platform for logistics. · Latvia’s Green Public Procurement (GPP) policies. |
Infrastructure & Logistics | · Limited digital tools for intermediary-free on-line sales · Geographically dispersed small farms struggling with aggregation. · High transport/storage costs. | · IT solutions (e.g., blockchain for traceability). · Municipal food hubs (Lithuania’s Pakruojis pilot). · Shared distribution networks. |
Consumer Engagement | · Perception of SFSC products as expensive (especially Sweden, Poland). · Low awareness of SFSC benefits. · Preference for convenience (supermarkets) & year round availability. | · Sweden’s Eldrimner educational campaigns. · Lithuania’s National Quality Labels (NKP) building trust. · Urban food festivals (Krakow’s initiatives). |
Funding & Investment | · Overreliance on EU subsidies. · Minimal private investment in SFSC scaling solutions · High certification & compliance costs for small producers. | · CAP Strategic Plans (2023–2027) with SFSC funding. · EIP-Agri grants for innovation (e.g., Lithuania’s food hubs). · Ukraine’s grassroots entrepreneurial models. |
Cross-Country Collaboration | · Divergent CAP implementations. · No regional SFSC organiser/enabler platform. · Urban-rural disconnects. | · Proposed Baltic SFSC Network under SFSC4FOODSEC. · Krakow-Riga-Malmö-Terespol urban partnerships. · Joint research (e.g., life cycle assessments, on-line markets, political economy). |
The dominance of large retail chains presents another formidable barrier to SFSC development throughout the region. In Lithuania and Poland, supermarket networks control over 70% of food sales and have created a supermarket-centred food culture, creating substantial market entry barriers for small producers who lack the resources to meet stringent retail requirements. This concentration of market power not only limits producer access but also perpetuates consumer dependence on conventional supply chains. Farmer-centred initiatives are disadvantaged, especially when there is little government support or intervention at the regulatory and policy level.
Ukraine's emerging craft food sector demonstrates some success in circumventing retail monopolies through digital platforms, but the broader regional picture reveals a food retail environment that systematically disadvantages SFSC participants. This market concentration underscores the need for targeted interventions on the part of government to rebalance power dynamics in food distribution networks.
Infrastructure limitations further constrain SFSC growth across the Baltic states. Latvia and Sweden report significant gaps in digital infrastructure for SFSC operations, with low adoption rates of dedicated platforms like Latvia's novadagarsa.lv. Poland's agricultural structure, characterized by small, fragmented landholdings under 10 hectares, creates inherent logistical challenges for product aggregation and distribution. These infrastructure deficits translate into higher transaction costs and operational inefficiencies that disproportionately affect small-scale producers. The resulting economic pressures often force farmers to either abandon SFSC models or operate them at scales too small to achieve meaningful market penetration.
Consumer perceptions and behaviors constitute another critical dimension of the SFSC challenge. In Sweden, price sensitivity remains a persistent barrier, with local food often perceived as prohibitively expensive. Polish consumers demonstrate limited awareness of SFSC benefits, while Lithuania's success in institutional procurement has not translated into comparable growth in retail demand for local products. These attitudinal barriers highlight the complex interplay between economic factors, cultural norms, and food consumption patterns that must be addressed to create viable markets for SFSC products. The consumer dimension suggests that policy interventions focused solely on production may prove insufficient without parallel efforts to reshape demand patterns and nurture a more farmer-centric food culture.
When examining cross-border challenges, the region faces additional layers of complexity. Despite shared membership in the EU framework (with Ukraine as an aspirant), CAP implementation varies significantly across countries. Lithuania and Poland have prioritized SFSCs in their rural development programs, while Sweden's approach emphasizes broader environmental subsidies rather than SFSC-specific support. This policy divergence creates missed opportunities for regional synergy and learning. The absence of robust platforms for cross-border collaboration further exacerbates this fragmentation, leaving potentially valuable innovations like Poland's APPETIT platform underutilized beyond national borders.
The urban-rural disconnect presents another regional-scale challenge. With the notable exception of Kraków's pioneering food security initiatives, most Baltic cities lack structured partnerships with their rural hinterlands. This disconnection prevents the translation of urban demand into sustainable markets for rural producers, perpetuating the dominance of long supply chains. The funding landscape reveals similar cross-border challenges, with overreliance on EU subsidies and minimal private investment in SFSC development across most of the region. Ukraine's local and regional government engaging in food production and distribution and the emerging craft food sector stands as an exception in this regard, demonstrating how local entrepreneurship can thrive given appropriate conditions.
Despite these challenges, the Baltic region also showcases innovative solutions that point toward potential pathways for SFSC mainstreaming. Lithuania's B2G model, which incorporates local food into school meal programs, demonstrates how public procurement can create stable markets for small producers. Poland's digital innovations, particularly the APPETIT platform, promise scalable solutions to logistical barriers when local governments become engaged . Sweden's educational campaigns through organizations like Eldrimner provide models for consumer engagement, while Latvia's Green Public Procurement policies illustrate how demand-side interventions can drive market transformation.
At the regional level, opportunities exist to build on these national innovations through enhanced cooperation. Harmonizing CAP strategic plans could unlock synergies in funding and policy implementation, while the proposed Baltic SFSC Network under the SFSC4FOODSEC initiative offers a platform for knowledge exchange and joint advocacy. Kraków's emerging model of urban-rural partnership provides a template that could be adapted across the region, particularly if supported by EU Urban Agenda funding mechanisms. The current food security crisis, highlighted by Ukraine's resilient informal networks, presents both a challenge and an opportunity to position SFSCs as essential components of crisis-responsive food systems.
The path toward SFSC mainstreaming in the Baltic region requires coordinated action at multiple levels. Nationally, governments must work toward policy coherence that embeds SFSCs within broader agricultural and food security strategies. Investments in digital infrastructure and physical logistics are equally critical to reduce the transaction costs that currently disadvantage small producers. Perhaps most challengingly, sustained efforts are needed to reshape consumer perceptions and purchasing behaviors to create viable markets for SFSC products.
The Baltic region's diversity, from Sweden's advanced advisory systems to Ukraine's resilient informal networks, creates a unique laboratory for SFSC innovation. By addressing both national and cross-border barriers while strategically building on existing bridges, the region has the potential to mainstream SFSCs as important contributors to the transition to a more sustainable, sovereign and secure food system.
A point of departure for further work in the SI-funded project Strengthening food security in the Baltic Region and Ukraine: pathways for growing local markets for locally-produced food (SFSC) as business venturesto start 1.10.2025 will be place-based SFSC that combine online food markets with physical markets.
Latvia | |
Lithuania | |
Poland | |
Sweden | |
Ukraine |
In terms of methodology, our approach will adapt and develop further the Golden Case method developed in the CORENET project which is building a pan-European network of SFSC advisors. Our project will draw on this emerging network and also contribute to it by making Baltic region and Ukranian SFSC experience more widely available.
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