ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book examines two communities in California upper San Joaquin Valley: one community surrounded by small-scale farms, the other surrounded by large-scale farms. Goldschmidt then attempted to discern how farm structure shapes community structure. The term is a catch-all of sorts that speaks generally of changes occurring throughout the food system. In the 1950s, agricultural economist Willard Cochrane introduced the concept of the agricultural treadmill. The book gives the knowledge of how to save and replant seeds is another resource that farmers lose when they cease practicing seed saving. The 1990s, however, marked a noticeable change in the literature, as scholarship expands beyond the farm gate. Research from New Zealand has led some to conclude that small-scale organic growers can in fact thrive under the current arrangement, even with the obvious infiltration of capital into organics.
