UTTRI associated faculty Professor Michael J. Widener presented “Connecting Urban Food Retail to Supply Chains” on October 19, 2020 for the School of Cities seminar series “Building Resilience in Food and Health Supply Chain.”
A welcome and introduction was provided by Professor Tracey Galloway of Anthropology, one of the co-leads for the “Building Resilience in Food and Healthy Supply Chains” urban challenge initiative of School of Cities.
In his presentation, Widener discusses the evolution of food retail environment research and how supply chains and retailer decision-making can progress this field.
Transportation systems have affected urban food stores and the supply chain, evolving from general stores relying on horse-driven carts to open markets supplied by railroad, to supermarkets serviced by fleets of trucks and distribution centers. The design of stores considered distribution points, featuring easy access bays for trucks and dense parking lots for end users. This eventual shift to a supermarket style standard was driven by suburbanization, globalization, industrial agriculture, and efficiency in bigger, fewer stores. However, this has left behind populations vulnerable to these changes.
Traditionally, food environment research follows the framework of Access, Diet, and Health. To investigate access, researchers would look at food deserts: large gaps in the city where it is hard to find groceries in walking distance, often making the best options buying food through fast-foods and higher-priced convenience stores. However, recent research has not been able to consistently tie living in food deserts to differences in dietary and health outcomes because of the wide variation in access and complications in individual diet and health caused by other factors like individual dynamics, household coordination, individual-level heterogeneity (e.g. social, political, capital), and dynamic urban environments.
There is also a gap in knowledge, where studies need to move from aggregate level to individual level analysis to link specific behaviours and geographies to outcomes. Widener uses trajectory-derived activity space exposures, finding that increased exposure to certain food options like fast-food led to eating more fast-food. Widener also looks at how partnered couples in households divided tasks, finding distinct trajectories due to differing exposures, showing gendered labour division.
Widener stresses that agency of retailers and suppliers is important in shaping the urban environment. However, there is a cycle in play:
- supply chains respond to changes in consumer demand;
- consumer demand shapes food retail geography; and
- food retail geography shapes supply chains.
Professor Galloway moderated Q & A following the presentation.
Watch the videorecording: Professor Michael J. Widener presents “Connecting Urban Food Retail to Supply Chains” on October 19, 2020
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