In recent times, the concept of “local food” has come to attention in academic and political discourse about food, usually closely linked to the growing debate on Alternative Agro-Food Networks. However, the meaning of “local food” is not yet consolidated and two main meanings can be identified. The first refers to the relationship between consumer and producer: local food is food produced by firms located in places close to the final consumer. The second meaning is focused on the product and the resources used in its production process. Both these (non-opposing) meanings often share “alternativeness” in the vision of food production and consumption, contrasting the dominant model of the globalised mass food chains. Both definitions use insights from new theoretical approaches to resources and space to emphasize the role of actors and the relevance of organizational proximity and local institutions in enabling the deployment of opportunities offered by local specific resources to local competitiveness. This paper explores the relationship between local food quality and local resources, starting from a discussion about the concept of local resources in economics, and exploring the different meanings of local food quality in the current debate about food.
