ABSTRACT
The analysis of local food initiatives presented the larger European Union-funded CORASON project. This was carried out in 12 European countries selected according to the Green Ring hypothesis, and contains those countries located in the geographical rim of Europe, characterised by a strong agrarian presence, that have followed pathways into modernity different from those of the earlier industrialising core. The privileged perspective for considering the place-embeddedness of food in the CORASON project is the analysis of the knowledge dynamics. We started from the assumption that the knowledge of the place, or local knowledge, is a constitutive element of local community, based on a specific method of knowing things and relations among things. The specific approach of knowledge dynamics shows the importance of re-localising knowledge while re-localising food. There is still a wealth of local knowledge in the rural areas of Europe that needs to be recognised, defended, used and valorised.
