The Food Systems Research Center is excited to feature Dr. Pablo Bose, Professor of Geography and Geoscience. His primary interest resides in exploring the complex relationships between people and place and how those relationships interact with flows of capital, labor, bodies, and ideas.
1. What current food systems research are you conducting?
There are three projects I’m involved with currently: I’m looking at the dynamics of food and migration with Dr. Teresa Mares in Anthropology, with a specific interest in resettled refugees and migrant farmworkers. I’m working with V and other organizations to help develop the for the state, focusing on food access, transportation barriers, and hopefully solutions. I’ve been working with the to support a couple of their funding programs, the program that connects recipients with fresh, local, and healthy foods, and more recently, the , which supports innovative food systems initiatives all across the country
2. What got you interested in food systems research?
Well, I’ve certainly always been interested in food, but in terms of food systems research, I came to it in a roundabout fashion. As someone who has been an interdisciplinary researcher my whole career – my undergraduate degrees are in the humanities and my graduate degrees in environmental studies – food was often a seemingly peripheral yet increasingly important part of many of the dynamics I was interested in. For example, for immigrant or diaspora communities, creating connections with new as well as old homes often meant understanding, adapting, and adapting to different food cultures. In my interest in how to build sustainable and just urban environments, access to food and nutrition again plays such a crucial role in helping to determine who has better or worse outcomes in all kinds of ways. In my research on environmental displacement and climate change, the production and consumption of food is a key driver of migration itself. The study of food and foodways is thus a perfect vehicle for exploring, unpacking, and intervening in some of the most crucial questions of our time.
3. How is your FSRC-funded research impacting Vermonters?
We conducted a study of the food deliveries being sent to resettled refugees and migrant farmworkers at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic to see what their preferences and experiences of receiving food assistance might be. One of the important tools we developed out of that research was a set of toolkits and food guides to assist newly arrived communities navigate the landscape of food access locally and simultaneously gave some direction to organizations like the as to how to best serve newcomers. I’m pleased to see that as the VT Foodbank has been reorienting some of its purchasing towards a diverse client base, they’ve taken on board some of those findings through, for example, the purchase of culturally preferred items in some of their latest policy shifts.
4. Where do you see the role of your field in expanding research on food systems at ¶¶Òõ̽̽ and beyond?
I don’t really approach food systems research through a disciplinary lens per se – my closest collaborators include anthropologists, epidemiologists, and ecologists, for example – but certainly, there are a number of geographers and geoscientists who have been leaders in the emerging field. I would love to see more involvement from some of my other amazing colleagues in GEO get involved with Food Systems at ¶¶Òõ̽̽.
5. What is something about you people would be surprised to learn?
I am not sure that anyone who’s seen my office in person or via zoom would be surprised that I like building Legos as a spare time activity, but they might be shocked at the sheer volume of how many I have managed to collect (especially since the start of the pandemic). Maybe they’d be surprised by how huge a fan I am of truly terrible sports franchises?
6. What’s your favorite thing about living in Vermont?
There are many, but if I had to narrow it down to one thing, it’s maple syrup. I could (and have) put maple syrup on anything. It’s the best. Sweet, savory, it doesn’t matter.
7. What TV show, band/artist, podcast, video game, book, and/or anything are you most obsessed with right now?
Generally speaking, anything sci-fi or fantasy, which means that I’m voraciously watching both the Star Wars series Andor and Game of Thrones House of the Dragon right now. Also, I adore nerdy podcasts like Imaginary Worlds and Greatest Generation, as well as cooking ones like Milk Street and Splendid Table.
