Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Food Commodity Market: History and Impact of Food Trading Toward SDG2

  • Living reference work entry
  • First Online:
Zero Hunger

Part of the book series: Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals ((ENUNSDG))

  • 129 Accesses

Synonyms

Food market; Food commodity exchange; Food trade; Food futures market

Definition

Food commodity markets are socioeconomic institutions, often located in specific geographical places. They are specialized in the exchange of agricultural products, such as staple crops (e.g., grains), animals (e.g., poultry), and animal products (e.g., butter). The exchanges are completed through financial transactions, such as futures contracts and options contracts.

Introduction

Food commodity markets are socioeconomic institutions that “encompass specific social, legal, and political processes that enable economic transactions, but also extend far beyond them” (Bestor 2001, p. 9227). After 2009 financial market crisis, which also impacted and created instability on food price trends on a global level, the public debate started looking at how the market of food products had been structured and strongly financialized. International institutions, such as FAO (2018b), pointed out at the risks...

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution

Institutional subscriptions

References

  • Algaze G (2018) Entropic cities: the paradox of urbanism in ancient Mesopotamia. Curr Anthropol 59:23–54

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Barstow C, Zocchi DM (eds) (2018) Kenya. Food, knowledge and history of the gastronomic heritage. Slow Food Editore, Bra

    Google Scholar 

  • Barthes R (1977) Image, music, text. Fontana Press, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Bestor TC (2001) Markets: anthropological aspects. In: Smelser NJ, Baltes PB (eds) International encyclopedia of the social & behavioral sciences. Elsevier, Amsterdam/Oxford, pp 9227–9231

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Bestor TC (2004) Tsukiji: the fish market at the center of the world. University of California Press, Berkeley/London

    Google Scholar 

  • Bintliff J (2002) Going to market in antiquity. In: Olshausen E, Sonnabend H (eds) Zu Wasser und zu Land, Stuttgarter Kolloquium 7. ranz Steiner Verlag, Stuttgart, pp 209–250

    Google Scholar 

  • Bohannan P (1955) Some principles of exchange and investment among the Tiv. Am Anthropol 57:60–70

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Braudel, F. (1972). The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean world in the age of Philip II, 2nd rev. edn. Collins, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Braudel F (1977) Afterthoughts on material civilization and capitalism. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore

    Google Scholar 

  • Carrier JG, Miller D (eds) (1998) Virtualism: A New Political Economy. London: Berg.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cipolla CM (1974) Storia economica dell’Europa pre-industriale. Il Mulino, Bologna

    Google Scholar 

  • Collins S (2015) The standard of Ur. British Museum Press, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Crump T (1990) The anthropology of numbers. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Di Francesco G (2013) Sagre enogastronomiche e sviluppo locale. I correlati socio-antropologici. In: Cipolla C, Di Francesco G (eds) La ragione gastronomica. FrancoAngeli, Milano, pp 261–275

    Google Scholar 

  • Eitenne XL, Irwin SH, Garcia P (2014) Bubbles in food commodity markets: four decades of evidence. J Int Money Financ 42:129–155

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • European Commission (2009) Agricultural commodity derivative markets: the way ahead. Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions a better functioning food supply chain in Europe. Com(2009): 591. Brussels: European Commission

    Google Scholar 

  • FAO (2011) The state of food insecurity in the world 2011. FAO, Rome

    Google Scholar 

  • FAO (2018a) The state of agricultural commodity market 2018. FAO, Rome

    Google Scholar 

  • FAO (2018b) The state of food insecurity in the world 2018. FAO, Rome

    Google Scholar 

  • Fino MA (2018) ‘EXEMPLA TRADERE’. Ricerche di diritto romano nella prospettiva dell’ecologia umana. Naples: Jovene, pp 109–204

    Google Scholar 

  • Foeken D (2006) “To subsidise my income”: urban farming in an east-African town. Brill, Leiden

    Google Scholar 

  • Fontefrancesco MF (2018a) Food festivals and expectations of local development in Northern Italy. Ethnologia Actualis 18:118–134

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fontefrancesco MF (2018b) Un paesaggio di mercati e campi. In: Corvo P, Fontefrancesco MF (eds) Sotto il cielo della Rift Valley. Sviluppo rurale e cibo tradizionale nella contea di Nakuru, Kenya. Tortona, Vicolo del Pavone, pp 13–16

    Google Scholar 

  • Food Security Information Network (2019) Global report on food crises 2019. Food Security Information Network

    Google Scholar 

  • Francis E (2002) Gender, migration and multiple livelihoods: cases from Eastern and Southern Africa. J Dev Stud 38:167–190

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Freedman P (2008) Out of the east: spices and the medieval imagination. Yale University Press, New Haven/London

    Google Scholar 

  • Friberg J (2007) A remarkable collection of Babylonian mathematical texts: manuscripts in the Schøyen collection cuneiform texts I. Springer, New York

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Geva B (1987) From commodity to currency in ancient history: on commerce, tyranny, and the modern law of money. Osgoode Hall Law J 25:115–158

    Google Scholar 

  • Greenhalgh P (1997) The history of craft. In: Dormer P (ed) The culture of crafts. Mancherster University Press, Mancherster

    Google Scholar 

  • Gregory CA (1982) Gifts and commodities. Academic, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Grimaldi P (1993) Il calendario rituale contadino: il tempo della festa e del lavoro fra tradizione e complessità sociale. FrancoAngeli, Milano

    Google Scholar 

  • Gudeman SF (2005) Community and economy: economy’s base. In: Carrier J (ed) A handbook of economic anthropology. Edward Eldar, Cheltenham

    Google Scholar 

  • Hann C, Hart K (eds) (2009) Market and society: the great transformation today. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

    Google Scholar 

  • Harper RF (1994) The code of Hammurabi king of Babylon. The University of Chicago Press, Chicago

    Google Scholar 

  • Haugerud A, Stone P, Little PD (2000) Commodities and globalization: anthropological perspectives. Rowman and Littlefield, Lanham

    Google Scholar 

  • Jowett (1999) Aristotle politics. Batoche Books, Kitchener

    Google Scholar 

  • Kenya R o (2013) Nakuru County first county integrated development plan (2013–2017). Republic of Kenya, Nairobi

    Google Scholar 

  • Khazanov AM (1994) Nomads and the outside world, 2nd edn. University of Wisconsin Press, Madison/London

    Google Scholar 

  • Kopytoff I (1986) The cultural biography of things: commoditization as process. In: Appadurai A (ed) The social life of things: commodities in cultural perspective. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp 64–93

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Le Goff J (1988) Your money or your life: economy and religion in the Middle Ages. Zone Books/MIT Press, New York/London. [distributor]

    Google Scholar 

  • Levi-Strauss C (1962) La pensée sauvage. Plon, Paris

    Google Scholar 

  • Magdoff F (2012) Food as a commodity. Mon Rev 63:15–22

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Marx K (1867) Das Kapital: Kritik der politischen Oekonomie. Vol. 1. Hamburg: Verlag von Otto Meissner

    Google Scholar 

  • Musyimi SL (2017) Agricultural market integration in Kenya: impact of transaction costs on regional maize markets. Margraf Publishers, Weikersheim

    Google Scholar 

  • O’Sullivan MD (1962) Italian merchant bankers in Ireland in the thirteenth century. A study in the social and economic history of medieval Ireland. [With a map.]. Figgis, Dublin

    Google Scholar 

  • Petino A (1989) Biografia dell’economia antica. Edizioni Scientifiche Italiane, Naples

    Google Scholar 

  • Poitras G (2000) The early history of financial economics, 1478–1776: from commercial arithmetic to life annuities and joint stocks. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham

    Google Scholar 

  • Polanyi K (2001) The great transformation: the political and economic origins of our time. Beacon Press, Boston, MA

    Google Scholar 

  • Rollinger R, Ulf C, Schnegg K (2004) Commerce and monetary systems in the ancient world: means of transmission and cultural interaction: proceedings of the fifth annual symposium of the Assyrian and Babylonian intellectual heritage project, held in Innsbruck, Austria, October 3rd–8th 2002. Franz Steiner, Stuttgart

    Google Scholar 

  • Sassen S (1998) Globalization and its discontents. New Press/I. B. Tauris, New York/London. [distributor]

    Google Scholar 

  • Schaede U (1989) Forwards and futures in tokugawa-period Japan: a new perspective on the Dōjima rice market. J Bank Financ 13:487–513

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Schiavone A (1999) La struttura nascosta. Una grammatica dell’economia romana. In: Giardina A, Schiavone A (eds) Storia di Roma. Einaudi, Turin

    Google Scholar 

  • Shiva V (ed) (2007) Manifestos on the future of food and seed. South End Press, Boston

    Google Scholar 

  • Short TL (2007) Pierce’s theory of sign. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Sillitoe P (2006) Why spheres of exchange? Ethnology 45:1–23

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Spyridakis M (ed) (2018) Market versus society. Palgrave Macmillan, London

    Google Scholar 

  • Thompson EA (2007) The tulipmania: fact or artifact? Public Choice 130:99–114

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wengrow D (2008) Prehistories of commodity branding. Curr Anthropol 49:7–34

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zocchi D (2018) Prodotti tradizionali, mercati e marginalità: il caso studio della contea di Nakuru. In: Corvo P, Fontefrancesco MF (eds) Sotto il cielo della Rift Valley. Sviluppo rurale e cibo tradizionale nella contea di Nakuru, Kenya. Tortona, Vicolo del Pavone, pp 25–28

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Gastronomic Sciences, Pollenzo, Italy

    Michele F. Fontefrancesco

Authors
  1. Michele F. Fontefrancesco
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Michele F. Fontefrancesco .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. FTZ-ALS, Hamburg University of Applied Sciences FTZ-ALS, Hamburg, Germany

    Walter Leal Filho

  2. Ctr Neurosci & Cell Biology, 1 Floor, Univ Coimbra, Edf Fac Medicina, Coimbra, Portugal

    Anabela Marisa Azul

  3. Faculty of Engineering and Architecture, Passo Fundo University Faculty of Engineering and Architecture, Passo Fundo, Brazil

    Luciana Brandli

  4. Istinye University, Istanbul, Turkey

    Pinar Gökcin Özuyar

  5. International Centre for Thriving, University of Chester, Chester, UK

    Tony Wall

Section Editor information

  1. Department of Agricultural Management, Rasht Branch, Islamic Azad University, Rasht, Iran

    Mohammad Sadegh Allahyari

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this entry

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this entry

Fontefrancesco, M.F. (2019). Food Commodity Market: History and Impact of Food Trading Toward SDG2. In: Leal Filho, W., Azul, A., Brandli, L., Özuyar, P., Wall, T. (eds) Zero Hunger. Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69626-3_13-1

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69626-3_13-1

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-69626-3

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-69626-3

  • eBook Packages: Springer Reference Earth and Environm. ScienceReference Module Physical and Materials ScienceReference Module Earth and Environmental Sciences

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation