ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to create a new compass with which to open the space for the debates with regard to the challenges and opportunities around rural land resources and their contribution to more sustainable and national “green-growth.” The arrival and development of the internationalised bio-economy reinforces and brings into sharp relief the public policy need for more effective, reflexive, and place-based debate about how the UK can create a real sustainable economic strategy. It is somewhat regarded as theoretically heretical to suggest such a condition as “post-neoliberalism” given the macro reaction of most of our national governments to the crisis of finance capital, by creating a deepening fiscal and welfare crisis on both sides of the Atlantic. The chapter explores the sets of conditions with a focus upon their implications for agri-food and rural land issues in the UK. It considers the crisis conditions with regard to contested sustainabilities on agri-food and rural development.
