The "A Place at the Table Lab” (APAT Lab) is a proposed "open workshop" for the study and celebration of working farmscapes and the special foods they produce. Scholars, students, community leaders, and citizen scientists are all welcome to engage in our lab work that may include policy analysis, geographic transecting and boundary analysis, economic geography, food studies, and cultural anthropology. It may also include community-led projects to document and celebrate these special places such as through agritourism, culinary tourism, and establishment of heritage areas.

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Food and agriculture landscapes (or "agrifoodscapes” for short) encompass unique regions that have evolved over generations through the sustained interaction of land, water, climate, and human stewardship, often with Indigenous knowledge. These naturally endowed areas, like valleys, basins, highlands, watersheds, plains, and bottomlands, that have the right soils and microclimates often develop special crops that result in "agricultural clusters," which include not only farms, but also allied enterprises such as input suppliers, packers, processors, artisanal food makers, distributors, and restaurants and other food service businesses. Nature and people come together to produce unique foods, which are arguably the ultimate expressions of place.

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Goût de Terroir (A Taste of Place)

The foods that emerge from agrifoodscapes carry the imprint of their origins. They reflect not only environmental conditions, but the choices people have made — how they select breeding stock, design specialized tools for production, and sometimes work collectively to establish codes of practice. In this sense, taste becomes a form of geographic knowledge. Understanding these relationships is central to the work of the APAT Lab. 

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Many Americans are generally familiar with how some countries, particularly in Europe, link the unique organoleptic qualities (taste and smell) of wine, cheeses, and other products to their place of production. This is the basis of protected designations of origin. However, they may be unaware that this so-called goût de terroir (French, taste of place) also applies to many agrifoodscapes in North America.

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A Range of Agrifoodscapes

Examples range from fragile Indigenous agrifoodscapes such as the Chimayo chili growing area and other landrace chilis grown by Indigenous seed savers on Pueblo tribal communities in the high desert of Northern New Mexico, to large specialty crop regions like the Concord Grape Belt on Lake Erie, where over 400 vineyards supply much of our grape juice. And there are more vernacular agricultural areas with strong regional food systems, like the San Juan Islands of Washington State that feature vibrant farm-to-table and farm-to-school programs, as well as multiple farmers markets and CSAs. Some contribute to our nation’s critical food supply, while others contribute more to local quality of life, health, and well-being. Each place is unique and has something special to offer the local residents who steward the land as well as to visitors who have the chance to experience a rich cultural immersion.

 

Complex and Dynamic Systems

These resilient agrifoodscapes are complex and dynamic systems in which ecological processes and cultural practices co-evolve, giving rise to distinctive foods, rewarding livelihoods, and fascinating ways of life. Moreover, these places serve as large reservoirs of Indigenous and local knowledge that is based on decades and sometime millennia of trial and error, longitudinal experimentation, and even citizen science. All of this can inform resilience in a world that is increasing volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous — today's VUCA world.
 

Fragility and the Need for Stewardship and Recognition

But some of these places are fragile and at risk, due to industrialization, climate change, globalization, and even benign neglect. The critical knowledge and lessons learned from the stewardship of these place is being lost. By documenting, mapping, and calling attention to these remarkable agrifoodscapes, the APAT Lab seeks to make visible the connections between place, practice, and food — connections that are essential to the resilience of food systems in fast-changing world.

 

​Learn more about Duncan Hilchey and the origin of the APAT Lab here.

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For more information about APAT Lab, including calling our attention to a special agrifoodscape, contact Duncan Hilchey: duncan@lysoncenter.org