Trusting food supply chains during the pandemic: reflections from Turkey and the U.S.

Abstract

Abstract We share in this reflection a selection of our own daily experiences and observations from Turkey and the U.S. of how Covid-19 has affected people’s relationship to shopping for food. We aim to show the multiple shifts that occurred in the mechanisms of trust that used to define how food is procured. We illustrate how disruptions in conventional and alternative food supply chains in both countries have had different effects on consumers. Our experiences, when juxtaposed, suggest that even in the case of abundance of food supply, shorter food supply chains prove to be more resilient against disruptions during the pandemic.