“We’re like matchmakers for farmers!” says Lucy McCarthy when asked to introduce her new venture.
McCarthy, Senior Lecturer in Management, and her business co-founder, Anne Touboulic, are no brokers of romantic partners, however.
Their “matchmaking” service is the Circular Agriculture Hub. This not-for-profit start-up – set to launch formally in 2024 – pairs farmers up with a broad range of community-based customers that include food banks, small food producers, social supermarkets and other users, offering an alternative set of buyers to the big supermarkets.
McCarthy and Touboulic have spent their academic careers questioning the increasingly devastating impact of the food industry on the environment, consumers and farmers. The Circular Agriculture Hub is the pair’s response to a deeply troubling picture in food supply chains.