Mike Crang is a cultural geographer by background, with long standing interests in heritage, local and regional cultures and identities. He is currently leading a work package on Southern China in the ESRC funded project ‘Sustainable Consumption, the Middle Classes and Agrifood Ethics in the Global South’. The project is looking at growing global consumption in the ‘BRICS’, and also involves work on Brazil and South Africa, and asks whether the forms of ethical and pro-environmental consumption, and consumer pressure, that we look to in the West will have traction in these new consumer markets. It explores the differing food heritages and values through interviews with corporate and regulatory actors, surveys of consumers and ethnographic go-along shopping and co-cooking sessions.
Previously Mike has attended to supply chains and logistics, especially ones that operate illicitly or in grey zones, examining the weaknesses and gaps that create opportunities for ‘moral arbitrage’ including in agrifood supplies, and thus the presence of illicit actors and commercially motivated food fraud. He has also worked extensively on waste, recycling and the circular economy – including the role of agrifood waste in bio-energy.
Contact Information
Phone: +44 (0)191 3341899
Email: m.a.crang@durham.ac.uk