ACROSS THE MOUNTAIN TRACKS: GLOBAL AGRI-FOOD NETWORKS AND AGRARIAN CHANGE IN LAOS' NORTHEAST BORDERLANDS

Abstract

This research aims to understand, through the experiences of households in Laos, how the engagement of rural populations in production of agricultural commodities for transboundary industries and markets shapes social change and livelihood outcomes. The study draws conceptually on economic geography (Global Production Networks) to respond to the contemporary agrarian question, that is: how globalisation reconfigures small-scale farming of food and agricultural commodities. From this entry point, the analytical focus of the study is the mutually constitutive process by which globalised agri-food production drives transition from semi-subsistence to commercial farming in agrarian settings, while also being functionally reliant on such transitions for the production of commodities. In the context of communities of swidden farmers in Laos’ mountainous northeast borderlands, the study explores the sequential formation of networks of production and consumption relating to commercial maize, and the commodity’s function as a key input in industrial animal feeds in neighbouring Vietnam.