Abstract
This article adopts the concept of prosumption in order to better understand the array of contemporary food sustainability transition initiatives that often come under the umbrella term of Alternative Food Networks (AFNs). AFNs have developed in parallel to prosumption, which is significant because AFNs are oriented towards localized and direct relationships between producers and consumers, while prosumption explains the hybridization of the consumer into a more complex and productive actor. Scholars argue that producer-consumer reconnections enable greater transparency and information exchange between the two types of actors. In addition, digitalization has recently brought new perspectives for both prosumption and AFN research. We explain the digital food prosumption phenomenon by drawing upon several years of research on an alternative food network with strong digital focus – La Ruche qui dit Oui!. As a decentralized network of local food operations that converge around a digital platform, it provides innovative virtual-material mediations between producers and consumers. This suggests that increasingly, consumers may be getting more deeply engaged in the (co-)production of commodities across different sectors and activities. Thus, while the prosumption and AFN literatures have mostly existed in parallel, future efforts should be made to intersect these two areas of sociological research. This is particularly pertinent today, as both prosumption and AFN phenomena are now increasingly mediated by powerful digital technologies. In the digital age, the alternative food prosumer phenomenon may well contribute to reconfiguring global food flows and industrial cultures towards sustainability.
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