Regional Players in between conventionalisation and regional development: Are supermarkets the wolves in sheep’s clothing?

Summary

Once bread from the local bakery was baked with grain of regional farmers milled in regional mill. Times have changed and so has the typical chain of custody: Food retailers with “shop in shop”-bakeries replace the local handicraft bakeries; the grain, flour or ready made rolls are transported over much longer distances than the average consumer would imagine. How do regional players in the food grain sector cope with the growing competition of supermarket chains and bread industries? How do they survive and succeed in a more and more supra-regional, national and global context? This is analysed within the frame of a project on regional vs. supra-regional product chains of organic bread in Lower Austria.