Introduction

The Routledge internationalhandbook of food studies is arguably themost comprehensive cross-disciplinary exposé of foodin contemporary social life. Interestingly, its 34chapters from internationally recognised scholars donot mention or address issues relating to crime orgenetic technologies (Albala, 2013). This is perhapsunsurprising given the relatively recent advent of‘food crime’ and the rapid advances inagro-technologies. Indeed, criminology's interest inglobal debates of food insecurity is relatively new,and even less interest, from a criminologicalstandpoint, has been devoted to food and technology(Johnson and Walters, 2014). This is surprisinggiven the links between corporate greed,governmental negligence and human starvation(Raghib, 2013). This edited volume seeks to redressthis oversight with a dedicated collection devotedto food crime and associated harms.

The United Nations (UN) World Food Programme (WFP)reports that there are 795 million people worldwidewho are undernourished (2017). The fact that 10 percent of the world's population lives in a dailystate of starvation and food insecurity is aninternational crisis that criminology can no longerignore. As a discipline devoted to, inter alia, exposing andexamining behaviours and actions that cause socialharm, human suffering, dislocation and disadvantage,it is imperative that issues of world hunger arecritiqued through a pervasive lens of state andcorporate power (Coleman et al, 2010; Tombs andWhyte, 2015). In doing so, this chapter draws oninnovative discourses in green criminology toexplore the issues of genetic technologies and thepolitics and power of food production anddistribution. It argues that food crime must also beunderstood within the discourses, debates andcontestations surrounding ‘knowledge’ and itsapplication to food security, distribution andconsumption. Those in positions of state andcorporate power that have the means to shape thecontours of global food trade, notably, what is safeto eat and what is not, requires an academicexamination of the ways in which ‘knowledgepolitics’ plays a crucial role in shaping publicdiscourse and influences political debate. In doingso, this chapter extends definitions of ‘food crime’to include a political economy analysis of foodproduction, distribution and consumption and theways in which ‘knowledge’ becomes imperative in aglobal politics of power and profit.