Kort'om Leuven - Leuven (Belgium)

Kort’om Leuven is a producers’ cooperative that was constituted in 2020 under the impulse of the international NGO Rikolto, with a substantial funding from public actors as well as the supporting advise of a series of actors from the civil society and the private social economy. The founders and present members of Kort’om are 16 local producers of Leuven (mainly farmers, but also a beekeeper and a small brewery) and the City of Leuven (which however maintains a “non-interference” policy towards the cooperative). Kort’om sells its products to local conventional retailers, restaurants, and since recently also to school canteens.

In order to analyse the concerns and relative goals that orient Kort’om Leuven, as well as the mechanisms and actions that characterize it, we interviewed 8 different persons connected to the initiative: 3 of its member farmers, the cooperative’s coordinator, the project manager responsible for the initiative from the NGO Rikolto, the deputy Mayor of the City Council of Leuven, two advisors from the cooperative CERA and the support center Innovatiesteunpunt.

These interviews allowed us to qualify Kort’om Leuven as an initiative which aims at contributing to the development of a local food system reducing the environmental impact of transportation-linked emissions and characterized by a multistakeholder governance empowering Leuven’s farmers. The table below summarizes the key concerns and goals of the initiative: 

Kort’om Leuven’s farmers use the legal and organizational structures provided by the cooperative to (a) self-manage internal decision-making processes, (b) mutualize logistic costs, and (c) sell products to proximity shops, traditional retailers and local restaurants. The table below summarizes the key mechanisms and actions operated by the initiative to attain its goals: