ABSTRACT
Technological innovations have played a significant role in shaping and transforming the products, production practices and socio-economic structures of agri-food systems over the past century. From the adoption of mechanical harvesters to new hybrid seed varieties, technological innovations have been associated with profound social, economic and environmental change. Over the past two decades, technoscientific innovations have also been at the heart of many controversies, crises and political struggles across the food system – including struggles over genetically modified (GM) foods, genetic erosion and contamination, the factory farming and cloning of animals, chemical pollution, the public health impacts of processed foods, the ‘food miles’ associated with the long-distance transportation of fresh and packaged foods, the corporate control of farmers and markets, and food scares such as ‘mad cow’ disease.
