{"id":633,"date":"2021-03-30T15:20:54","date_gmt":"2021-03-30T14:20:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/foodsystemimpactscv19\/?p=633"},"modified":"2021-03-30T15:20:54","modified_gmt":"2021-03-30T14:20:54","slug":"a-promising-career-in","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/foodsystemsimpactscv19\/2021\/03\/30\/a-promising-career-in\/","title":{"rendered":"A promising career in\u2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

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By Tim Wilkinson<\/strong><\/p>\n

In Sky television\u2019s humorous political thriller Tom Clancy\u2019s Jack Ryan<\/em>, while on a dinner date the protagonist Jack Ryan describes himself as being in \u2018Supply Chain Logistics\u2019. This is cover for his real job as a CIA analyst and anti-terrorist operative. It reminds me of the moment in HBO\u2019s Sopranos<\/em>, where gangster Tony Soprano answers a question about the nature of his job by saying: \u2018I\u2019m in the waste management business\u2019. These comments are both intended as funny moments in the shows \u2013 with the joke (if we can call it that) being that a mundane sounding job title conceals something thrilling and illicit. \u2018Supply Chain Logistician\u2019 and \u2018Waste Management\u2019, are both stereotypes of jobs too banal to warrant further remark and are used to discourage further questions. But given the interest in the food supply chain and food waste over the last year, one can easily imagine a parallel universe. One in which a Supply Chain Logistician or Food Waste Manager are at a party and feel the need to pretend they have another job (a Video Game Designer or Ski Instructor, perhaps) \u2013 to avoid a throng of excited guests asking one hundred and one questions about how the food supply chain really works.<\/p>\n

I have been collecting lots of diagrams of the food system and food supply chain this month. I\u2019ve been looking at similarities and differences in how the system and supply chain are represented. Some diagrams are very simple and others are very complex. While there are often similarities, there are also lots of differences too; particularly in the categories used to express stages of the supply chain or elements of the system. It\u2019s all pretty complicated. I\u2019ve been thinking about why that is. Here\u2019s a list of features of the food system that make it hard to understand:<\/p>\n