News, Activities & Events

O Projeto STRINGS organiza no próximo dia 8 de Junho às 18h, o Workshop de Apresentação dos seus Principais Resultados

(Apenas em Português)

É com enorme prazer que a equipa do projeto STRINGS - Vendendo o rural nas lojas (urbanas) gourmet: o estabelecimento de novas relações entre a cidade e o campo através da venda e do consumo de produtos rurais, vem convidar-vos a estarem presentes no Workshop de apresentação e discussão dos resultados do projeto!

O Workshop a ter lugar no dia 8 de junho pelas 18h, dirige-se a todos aqueles que contribuem para a produção, distribuição, comercialização, promoção e consumo de produtos agroalimentares de proveniência rural e também a todos os agentes, associações e organizações interessadas na promoção do desenvolvimento agrícola e rural.

Pretendemos com este evento:

  • apresentar e discutir os principais resultados obtidos pelo projeto STRINGS com base nos dados recolhidos com donos (as) de lojas urbanas de especialidade, consumidores, produtores e distribuidores;
  • propor e debater estratégias mais eficazes para melhorar a comunicação e relações entre os diferentes intervenientes deste processo;
  • Reunir contributos para elaborar um documento com recomendações específicas para futuras políticas de desenvolvimento socioeconómico que considerem as potencialidades das produções locais para o desenvolvimento de territórios rurais e para o reforço das relações entre os meios rurais e urbanos.

Desde já agradecemos a vossa colaboração, atenção e disponibilidade e reiteramos o nosso prazer em contar convosco no dia 8 de junho!

STRINGS Team organizes a Thematic Session in the X APDEA Congress and IV Lusophone Meeting on Economics, Sociology, Environment and Rural Development (ESADR 2022) 

Coimbra, ESAC, 14-16 September 2022
(Abstracts and presentations are accepted both in Portuguese and in English)


The STRINGS Team (Elisabete Figueiredo, Mónica Truninger, Teresa Forte and Alexandre Silva) organizes a session (ST4) titled Between production, marketing and consumption of traditional agrifood products - what contributions to the promotion of rural development?

You may submit an abstract until 15 March 2022!! 

For abstract submission and for more information about the congress and the session, please visit - https://apdeaesadr.wordpress.com/topicos-congress-topics/ 

New Deadline for Abstracts: August 1!!

Call for Abstracts to the Special Session (SS08) - Selling the rural in the city: the role of rural provenance food products in reconfiguring new rural-urban connections and fostering territorial development - of the 28th APDR Congress. 

STRINGS Project is organizing a Special Session on the 28the APDR Congress, to be held at UTAD, Vila Real 16-17 September 2021. Abstracts must be submitted until July 5 through the link provided on the website. Please click on the image to know more information on the Special Session and on the submission process! 

STRINGS at the Seminar on Innovation in Rural Territories

The Seminar is organized by DOLMEN - Local and Regional Development and will be held online on the 18 of June 2021 (14h30). The Seminar will be in Portuguese.

The title of the presentation of the STRINGS is 'Proudly Traditional? Innovation and tradition in the commercialization of rural provenance products and in the restructuring of rural-urban connections'.

Please register by clicking on the image below.


Complete Interview to the podcast Ciência com Impacto (Science with Impact) of Elisabete Figueiredo

Ciência com Impacto, 26 November 2020

Click on the image to watch the short video 

STRINGS project in the podcast Ciência com Impacto (Science with Impact)

Elisabete Figueiredo, Sociologist, and PI of the STRINGS project, talking about her research work on rural territories and on the relevance rural provenance food may have to the dynamization of the fragile rural economies.

Click on the image to watch the short video

STRINGS project on Diário de Notícias Newspaper (including short video)

Diário de Notícias, November, 27, 2020

STRINGS 3rd Meeting to discuss next stage and tasks, using Zoom

Zoom, April, 22, 2020

On April 22, 2020, STRINGS team members meet online, using Zoom, to discuss the tasks performed so far and to planned the tage and tasks ahead. Elisabete Figueiredo, Carlos Rodrigues, Celeste Eusébio, Teresa Forte, Carlos Ribeiro (University of Aveiro), Mónica Truninger, Alexandre SIlva (ICS -UL) , Jorge Rocha, Paulo Morgado (IGOT - UL), Manuel Luís Tibério (UTAD) together with the project consultants - Maria Fonte and Artur Cristóvão - discuss the progress of the project and the fieldwork ahead, taking into account the new situation of COVID19. 

Thank you, Team!

Questionário do projeto STRINGS aos clientes das lojas especializadas em produtos agroalimentares provenientes de áreas rurais nacionais / Questionnaire to customers of specialty rural food provenance food stores (Lisbon, Porto and Aveiro stores

 Projecto STRINGS - Investigação sobre o comércio alimentar especializado e o seu papel na reativação de ligações com o mundo rural (coordenação da Univesidade de Aveiro) - Colabore connosco preenchendo um pequeno questionário anónimo sobre os seus hábitos de consumo. Questionário disponível https://forms.gle/ELqF2tmYTeRGEwTY7

STRINGS Project - Research about specialised food retail and its role in reactivating links with the rural (coordination of Universidade de Aveiro) - Cooperate with us by filling a small anonymous questionnaire about your consumer habits. Questionnaire available https://forms.gle/Ni9hbTJpetqKcsag6  

The Call for Abstracts to the VIII Congresso Português de Estudos Rurais and to the VIII Encontro RuralReport is now open 

Ponte de Lima e Sistelo, 5-7 Dececember 2019

(in portuguese only)

O tema do congresso é: Paisagens Culturais - Heranças e Desafios do Território.

O que são paisagens culturais? Enquanto traços identitários dos territórios ou como recurso para turismo em espaço rural, as paisagens culturais têm vindo a assumir crescente relevância em Portugal. Esta importância está expressa na necessidade de as preservar e valorizar, conduzindo à decisão sobre a primeira classificação de uma paisagem cultural como Monumento Nacional, a aldeia de Sistelo, em dezembro de 2017.

Ao passarem dois anos sobre esta data, a Sociedade Portuguesa de Estudos Rurais (www.sper.pt), a Rede de História Rural em Português (www.histruralpt.wordpress.com) e a Escola Superior Agrária do Instituto Politécnico de Viana do Castelo (https://www.ipvc.pt/escola-agraria) organizam, o CER2019.

STRINGS Project Kickoff Meeting

DCSPT, University of Aveiro, October 11, 2018

The STRINGS project started! On October 11, 2018, the team members meet at the Department of Social, Political and Territorial Sciences at the University of Aveiro, Portugal, to start discussing the project's first task - Literature Review and operationalization of the main concepts. Elisabete Figueiredo, Mónica Truninger, Carlos Rodrigues, Celeste Eusébio, Manuel Luís Tibério, Paulo Morgado, Adria Maia, Ana Fernandes, Joana Correia, together with the project consultants - Maria Fonte and Artur Cristóvão - and two external observers - Sandra Valente and Rosângela Soares, discuss the project main aims, methodology, tasks and outputs!

Let's Go, Team!


Exploring places & practices through Transformative Methods 

Tampere, Finalnd, May 7-10, 2019

Which innovative, unconventional methods are being experimented with to disrupt the established norms in place-based research? How to effectively engage people in place-based research, including marginalised voices? How can researchers' and practitioners' reflexivity guide fruitful experimentation and learning, while acknowledging their normative orientations and ethical underpinnings? What are the future prospects of research for transformative change?

These are some of the burning issues currently facing sustainability transformation research, and some of the question that will be addressed in the #SUSPLACE2019 Final event.


STRINGS Second Meeting to decide the adequate criteria to typify urban specialty food stores

DCSPT, University of Aveiro, Portugal, 16 April, 2019.

On April 16, 2019, STRINGS team members meet at the Department of Social, Political and Territorial Sciences at the University of Aveiro, Portugal, to start discussing the project's second task - Collection and Preliminary typification of specialty stores. Elisabete Figueiredo, Mónica Truninger, Carlos Rodrigues, Celeste Eusébio, Manuel Luís Tibério, Jorge Rocha, Alexandre Silva, Adria Maia, Ana Fernandes, Joana Correia, Inês Van Zeller and Rosângela Soares, together with the project consultants - Maria Fonte and Artur Cristóvão - discuss the criteria to collect information from stores. Fieldwork will start soon!

Thank you, Team!


STRINGS is hiring a PhD fellow  - deadline April, 2, 2019

STRINGS is recruiting a PhD fellow for  position for a first level doctorate for the exercise of activities of scientific research in the scientific areas of Sociology, Social Sciences, Geography, Regional and Urban Planning, Tourism or related areas.

More information:on https://www.eracareers.pt/opportunities/index.aspx?task=showAnuncioOportunities&jobId=111586&idc=1 

 https://www.ua.pt/sgrhf/PageText.aspx?id=15052 

STRINGS organizes a Special Session at the IRSA2020 - XV World Congress of Rural Sociology - Rural Sustainability in the Urban Century. 

The Call for Abstracts is now open (until December, 23, 2019)

Cairns, Australia, 8-12 July 2020

Organized by Elisabete Figueiredo, Mónica Truninger and Celeste Eusébio, the Session The Countryside in the City: rural provenance foods' promotion and selling as ways of establishing and reinforcing new rural-urban connections, aims at analyzing the potential and effective contribution of rural provenance food products' promotion and selling (e.g. in specialty or regular urban stores, farmers markets in urban locations; food festivals and other events) in fostering rural-urban connections, agricultural activities and in rural areas attractiveness. The Session invites theoretical and empirical contributions that deal - from diverse perspectives and cases from different countries - among others, with the following topics:

  • What rural provenance foods are promoted and sold in urban areas and through what means and formats?
  • What aesthetic/cosmetic features are privileged in urban food specialty shops that convey meanings and images around the rural?
  • What are the roles of those products and processes in fostering rural attractiveness?
  • What are the values attributed by urban consumers to those products?
  • What impacts may have these processes in farming and in rural-urban connections?

XXVIII ESRS Conference - Rural Futures in a Complex World

Trondheim, Norway, June 25-28, 2019

Rural futures sit at the nexus of contemporary global challenges. Some of the challenges facing rural areas in the 21st century include climate change, migration, ageing, depopulation, technological innovations and urbanisation. Significantly, not all rural areas are alike: some lie close to urban centres and are embedded within a wider hinterland, while others are extremely remote, often struggling to survive. 


ESRS Autumn School 2018
Social Innovation in and for Sustainable Food Provision

Riga, Latvia, November 5-9, 2018

The objective of the ESRS Autumn School 2018 "Social Innovation in and for Sustainable Food Provision" is to advance scientific knowledge of PhD students in rural sociology and related disciplines (e.g. agriculture and food studies, nutrition and public health) about the role social innovation plays in contemporary food provision. The Autumn School will look into conditions, frameworks and mechanisms of social innovation as well as its outcomes and effects on our food systems.  


New book on Mobilities, Life trajectories and Rural sustainability

The book (in Spanish) coordinated by Jesus Oliva - Movilidades, trayectorias vitales y sostenibilidad rural - has just been published. 

Elisabete Figueiredo, Coordinator of the STRINGS project has co-authored (with Jesus Oliva Serrano and Jonathan Teles Breda) two chapters about São Jacinto, Aveiro, discussing the strategies of mobility and their contribution to social sustainability. São Jacinto (together with Gran Vega of Seville and the Navarre Pyrenees) was one of the case studies of the project MOVIDIVERSOS coordinated by Jesus Oliva of the Public University of Navarra. 
Check out the contents of the book and read the introduction by clicking on the image.  


STRINGS is hiring a Research Fellow with a Master Degree in Sociology, Human Geography or related scientific areas

Call for a research fellow with a Master Degree in Sociology, Geography and related scientific areas, to work within Strings project. The place of work will be the Institute of Social Sciences of the University of Lisbon. 

More information on the Call, research activities to be developed, admission requirements and other relevant issues related with the position by clicking the image above.

Join the STRINGS Team!


Call for abstracts for the Session about STRINGS at the 26th APDR Congress - Selling 'rural food' in urban contexts: a way of establishing and reinforcing new rural-urban connections?

University of Aveiro, 4 and 5 July, 2019

The Call for abstracts to the 26th APDR Congress, to be held in the University of Aveiro (4 and 5 July 2019) is now open, until April, 16, under the general theme: Evidence-based territorial policymaking: formulation, implementation and evaluation of policy.

We call your attention to the session SS04 'Selling 'rural food' in urban contexts: a way of establishing and reinforcing new rural-urban connections?' organized by Elisabete Figueiredo, Monica Truninger, Maria Eusebio and Carlos Rodrigues

More information on the Session, by clicking the picture. 

More information on the Congress here: https://www.apdr.pt/congresso/2019/index.html

STRINGS organizes a Special Session at the INVTUR 2020 - Tourism and Sustainable Development Goals: from theory to practice 

University of Aveiro, Aveiro, Portugal,  13-15 May 2019

Together with the project Twine - Co-creating sustainable Tourism & WINe Experiences in rural areas (POCI-01-0145-FEDER-032259), STRINGS organizes the Special Session:  Wine and Food Tourism in Rural Areas: Concepts, Cases, Challenges and Connections.

Wine and food tourism have received a growing interest from academics, markets, agents, politicians, and local and regional development agencies, during the last years. Both wine and food tourism, together or separately, are often seen as appealing experiences and tourism products able to contribute to the attractiveness and development of the territories of its production and transformation, which are, very often, rural areas. Being purchased and consumed in their contexts of production, local food and wine products may represent key elements in the promotion of the countryside and in the overall tourism experience in a rural context. Food and wine are important parts of a territory's culture and identity, reflecting the biophysical characteristics of the local contexts, the main agricultural productions, activities and traditions, together with the 'savoir faire' and particular values and practices developed throughout the centuries. Particularly in a tourism context, wine and food consumption tend to place people in a specific culture and social universe. Wine and food are, therefore, an important part of the rural tourism supply and experience, where tasting locally produced wines and food products is marketed together with local culture, landscape features, activities and lifestyles, sometimes through routes, terroir, local/ regional branding and wine and food festivals, markets and fairs.