From the 11th to the 13th January 2017, the international sym
posium “Mountain regions, territories of innovation” was held in Grenoble, France. It has been organised by the LabEX ITEM (Innovation and Mountain Territories), a multi-disciplinary laboratory on mountain research. The aim of the event was to address the diverse development trajectories of mountain territories in a context of transition.
One of the thematic sessions “Territorial labelling : holding onto heritage and innovating? Putting “distinction” to the test of time” looked at the strategies and intentions behind labels linked to mountain areas and how they develop over time. In this session, Alice Dos Santos, our former intern, introduced her preliminary results of her master thesis on the labelling of mountain food products in Europe.
In 2016, with the help of Euromontana’s members, she studied three -very distinct- labels of mountain food products across Europe: the PDO comté, the Basque Eusko Label and the Swiss brand Pro Montagna of Coop. In her research, she explored the social mechanisms behind the construction and evolution of the labels and the role that the different territorial actors played in those processes. The three cases showed differences in term of strategies (diversification or specialisation) and in term of ownership of the label (value chain, government or retailer-owned) that are reflected in the way actors are organised and collaborate together.
Alice’s project was co-supervised by Sietze Vellema (Knowledge, Technology and Innovation group of Wageningen UR) and Dominique Barjolle (Sustainable Agroecosystems group of ETH Zurich). She is currently finalising the writing of her master thesis and is looking forward to share in more details her results with Euromontana and the mountain actors engaged in the valorisation of food products.
