Promoting Resilience tO Plant diseaSe: Understanding vulnerability and adaptation to Xylella fastidiosa

Plant health is vital for sustainable development. Plant pathogens threaten economies, food security, and rural livelihoods. Existing plant disease research focuses on ecology, epidemiology, and economic losses. This overlooks social questions such as what makes farmers vulnerable to plant disease and what enables them to adapt.

Without this knowledge, it is difficult to develop equitable solutions to manage plant disease.

During my MSCA fellowship, I will work with the Laboratory for the Analysis of Social-Ecological Systems in a Globalised World (LASEG) at the Autonomous University of Barcelona.

Working with experts on environmental governance and rural wellbeing, I will develop a novel approach to understanding the political ecology of plant disease.

My empirical focus is Xylella fastidiosa, an invasive bacteria that is considered the most serious threat to EU plant health in generations.

I will conduct fieldwork in two regions of Spain facing an outbreak of XF: the Balearic Islands and the Valencian Community.

During preliminary research in these regions in 2019 and 2022, I built a team of stakeholders that includes farmers, government officials, agricultural cooperatives, scientists, and more.

I will 1) use Q-method to map stakeholder perspectives on Xylella governance; 2) interview farmers to understand Xylellas impacts in terms of differential vulnerability and ability to adapt; and 3) conduct participatory Photovoice workshops to engage rural communities in envisioning possible rural futures for living with Xylella.

Through a six-month traineeship with the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), my findings will feed into ongoing science and policy dialogues on Xylella. By foregrounding place-based knowledge, my approach will help inform more equitable plant health policies.

Specifically, we will answer calls to merge top-down efforts to manage plant pathogens with bottom-up approaches that take into account farmers lived experiences and realities.