Perspectives from Moscow’s Alternative Food Network

Limited research has analyzed how the values espoused by Western alternative food systems, such as taste and territoriality, are adopted and refashioned in post-socialist societies. Muscovites now echo the global quality turn that reconnects consumers to their food sources. This research qualitatively explores the perspectives of the cosmopolitan consumers of the LavkaLavka farmer cooperative and various leaders of food system change in Moscow. Findings examine how perceptions of these actors shape the development of Moscow’s alternative food network, particularly in regard to their constructions of place and the unique tastes they associate with regional localities. It also questions the extent to which social relationships among these actors attempt to bridge the growing rural-urban class divide in Russia. While the shift in consumer values reveals positive associations between food quality and territoriality, it raises concern of the socially embedded practices that perpetuate urban exclusivity and marginalize rural Russian farmers