Grow at home, buy local: (De)commodifying ‘rural’ vegetables and herbs

In Vietnam, people are increasingly concerned about the absence of food standards and the danger this poses to their families’ health. In Hanoi, urbanites are in search of clean and safe vegetables. Using results from fieldwork in Hanoi, this paper presents three strategies urbanites use to ensure food safety in the fresh produce they eat. They rely on trust-based strategies, when maintaining their daily practice of buying from local vendors or receiving their fresh food supply from relatives and friends residing in the countryside. In addition, urbanites are increasingly cultivating herbs and vegetables at home in roof top gardens or on fallow urban land. From the analysis of these strategies two main arguments are developed: First, by embedding the supply with fresh produce in social relationships and growing food at home urbanites actively shorten agricultural wholesale commodity chains. The value of vegetables and herbs in urban Vietnam is no longer solely determined by the monetary exchange value, but is assigned with a social exchange value. Accordingly, the paper argues that the commodity of fresh vegetables is being taken out of its commodity sphere, thus signifying the beginning of a process of singularization (Kopytoff, 1988). Second, by cultivating fresh produce in the city urbanites creatively employ the urban built environment and thence the materiality and materials that the city has to offer. The paper concludes that this identifies an affirmation of urban life and urbanites’ “social creativity”, their willingness to improve their living (Korff, 1991: 15), by dealing with the challenges and contingencies of the city.