From Shock to Strategy: How Planners and Practitioners Conceptualize Food System Resilience Across Place

Abstract

Food systems planning has become a significant part of the field of urban and regional planning. However, as the world continues to change and shocks occur due to significant stressors, planners and practitioners must be creative with how they support the local food system and respond to these shocks. Through the employment of semi-structured interviews with various planners and practitioners affiliated with the American Planning Association Food Division (APA FOOD), this study employed qualitative methods to identify various epidemiological, , climate and politico-economic shocks to the food system. This is done while investigating the shocks through the lens of geographical diversity, institutional capacity, and community-based collaboration. This study found that food system resilience is conceptualized and operationalized through place-based, collaborative strategies shaped by regional conditions, institutional capacity, and the interconnected nature of social, economic, and environmental shocks. This research underscores that food systems are not merely technical or logistical challenges, but social and relational systems that reflect broader questions of equity, power, and belonging.