"Indian Hop Pickers at Kent" O.P. Anderson (photographer), Reproduction SHS 1,975,
Museum of History and Industry, Seattle Historical Society Collection

Geography 271
The Geography of Food and Eating

May 14 Workshop (Spring Quarter 2008)

A research workshop is scheduled during quiz/discussion section on May 14 which will focus on strategies for researching the commodity chain you have selected for Assignment #3. This is a challenging research project because commodity chains are complex and very few published studies of commodity chains are available. Your research will not be successful if you rely exclusively on 'commodity chain' as a search term. Therefore the goal of the workshop will be for each of you to develop a research plan which will include strategies for conceptualizing aspects of the commodity chain for your product and selecting resources from the extensive list below that will be most useful for exploring how and where your product is produced, distrbuted, and consumed. This worksheet, or a modified version of it, will be used during the workshop.

Your TA will be able to tell you the location for your section's workshop on May 14.

Is the Article Scholarly or Popular?

Commodity Chain Research

What is it?

Process and Resources

Sources of Background & Statistical Information

Encyclopedias / Overview Sources
Oxford Encyclopedia of Food & Drink in America UW restricted
Encyclopedia of Food & Culture UW restricted
CQ Researcher UW restricted Topical overviews with leads to additional reading.
 
Information about Companies
Hoover's Online UW restricted Provides company profiles, corporate directory (searchable by company name, industry, ticker symbol, sales, location), market quotes, and business news.
Mergent Online UW restricted - Covers approximately 10,000 public companies and their SEC filings
 
Corporate Monitoring Groups
Corporate Watch (UK)
CorpWatch (US)
Sweatshop Watch
Greenpeace
Human Rights Watch - Business & Human Rights
 
Information about Countries
Europa World Online UW restricted "Presents political and economic information on countries and territories as well as international organizations. Features statistical data and directories."
Country Studies/Area Handbooks published by the Federal Research Division, Library of Congress. These book length reviews cover history, society and environment, government and politics, economics, culture, health, education systems, etc.
Economist Intelligence Unit. UW restricted Country Reports analyse political and economic trends in nearly 200 countries. Country Profiles outline a country's economic and political status and background.
 
Data About Products & Markets
US of A
FedStats, one-stop portal for statistical data provided by U.S. federal agencies (census, labor, trade, consumer price indexes, etc.).
Foreign Agricultural Service of the U.S. Dept of Agriculture
Trade Statistics Online an information sheet from the International Trade Administration US Dept of Commerce
U.S. International Trade Commission Trade Dataweb Registration required to access import/export data but its FREE. Also provides selected regional and product/industry analyses. USA must be a trading partner for the commodity/product

Other Countries
UN Commodity Trade Statistics Database (UN Comtrade), "...contains detailed imports and exports statistics reported by statistical authorities of close to 200 countries or areas. It concerns annual trade data from 1962 to the most recent year. UN Comtrade is considered the most comprehensive trade database available ... A typical record is – for instance – the exports of cars from Germany to the United States in 2004 in terms of value (US dollars), weight and supplementary quantity (number of cars). The database is continuously updated."
World Trade Analyzer UW restricted
Access data for 600 commodity groups for 192 countries over 18 years (1985-2002). Created from data reported by member countries to the United Nations Statistical Office and later compiled by Statistics Canada which has corrected inconsistencies in the data (nation name changes over time, etc.). Recent trade data must be gathered using the UN trade databases, however WTA will help those who need to do comparisons of trade flows over time.
TradeStats Express, US Dept of Commerce, International Trade Administration - U.S. National import/export data and State Export Data. Added features include Global Patterns of U.S. Merchandise Trade and Product Profiles of U.S. Merchandise Trade with a Selected Market. Options for producing charts and extracting data tables are provided.
Food Price Crisis - World Bank Topics in Development website provides regional summaries of food price increase impacts and "Behind the News" links to policy and informational materials.
 
 

Articles in Magazines & Journals

Multi-Subject

Academic Search Complete UW restricted
Popular and scholarly articles on all major fields of study in the humanities, social sciences, and sciences.
Expanded Academic Index UW restricted
Provides access to articles in approximately 1,500 scholarly and general interest periodicals, covering all major fields of study in the humanities, social sciences, and science and technology. Full text of ~700 publications is included in the database.
Web of Science UW restricted
Includes Science Citation Index Expanded (SCI-EXPANDED), 1965-present; Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI), 1975-present; and Arts & Humanities Citation Index (A&HCI), 1975-present.

Business/Economics

ABI/Inform Global UW restricted
Covers approximately 1800 business magazines and scholarly journals for topics such as business and economic conditions, management techniques, theory, and practice of business, advertising, marketing, economics, human resources, finance, taxation, computers, etc. 1971-present.
ABI/Inform Trade & Industry UW restricted
Covers 750 business periodicals and newsletters with a trade or industry focus. Very good for practicioners needing the latest industry news, product and competitive information, marketing trends, etc. Contains publications on every major industry, including finance, insurance, transportation, and construction.
EconLIT UW restricted
Scholarly articles, conference proceedings and working papers in economics.

Environment

Agricola UW restricted
Produced by the National Agricultural Library, this database provides access to journal articles and book chapters about agricultural and related sciences
CAB Abstracts UW restricted
CAB Abstracts covers the applied life sciences, including agriculture, forestry, human nutrition, veterinary medicine and the environment. Useful for international development research.
Environmental Sciences and Pollution Management UW restricted
Multidisciplinary database providing comprehensive coverage of the environmental sciences.

Geography

GeoBASE UW restricted
Provides access to articles in journals of human geography (including urban, political and economic geography), physical geography (ecology, geology, geomechanics), oceanogeography and international and development studies

Health Care

CINAHL UW restricted
Provides access to articles in over 700 journals in nursing and 17 allied health disciplines from 1982-present.
PubMed
PubMed, a service of the National Library of Medicine, includes over 14 million citations for biomedical articles back to the 1950's. These citations are from MEDLINE and additional life science journals. To find full text of articles, look for the UW Holding button OR search the list of e-journals provided on HealthLinks.
News
ABI/Inform Trade & Industry UW restricted
Covers 750 business periodicals and newsletters with a trade or industry focus. Very good for practicioners needing the latest industry news, product and competitive information, marketing trends, etc. Contains publications on every major industry, including finance, insurance, transportation, and construction.
Alt-Press Watch UW restricted
Provides fulltext of the newspapers, magazines and journals of the alternative and independent press. This interdisciplinary resource of over 170 titles provides a valuable source of viewpoints and perspectives to complement and challenge the coverage of the mainstream media.
Factiva UW restricted
Provides access to global news and business information, including newswires, newspapers, magazines, and trade publications; including Dow Jones and Reuters newswires, Wall Street Journal, and New York Times; sources are from 118 countries in 22 languages
Lexis-Nexis UW restricted
Access to news and business publications from across the US and around the world.

Public Policy & International Relations
PAIS International UW restricted
Provides access to magazine and journal articles, selected books, and selected publications from agencies of the U.S. federal government and the United Nations published 1972-present on the topics of public policy and international relations.

If you are having difficulty finding information on your topic with these resources, there are always other places to look. The Browse Subjects portion of the Libraries' Information Gateway may help you find additional resources. Research help is available 24/7.

updated 6/19/08 by Anne Zald,University of Washington Libraries