Maintien des valeurs dans la croissance de la bio. Enseignements du projet HealthyGrowth

Summary

How do organic initiatives and food chains succeed in maintaining their foundational values along and despite their growth process? This question which appears central in the “conventionnalisation debate” has been tackled by the European project HealthyGrowth (2013-2016, Eranet Core Organic program). In this project, 11 teams from different countries developed and applied to 22 case studies, 5 different perspectives dealing with organization modes and governance, management strategies, communication of values, mediation of values, and resilience in a context of crises and changes. The cross analysis of these case studies, carried out through a multi-perspective approach, made it possible to identify 3 important aspects which allow maintaining values along the growth process: a continuous process of re-affirmation and sometimes redefinition of core values over time, a synchronization of time horizons that stabilizes the different actors’ expectations and commitments, and a process of professionalization which takes different forms and meanings.