The SAMUTER project (Multifunctional and Territorialised Agri-food Systems) studies those agri-food systems which, in addition to being multifunctional – as most of the existing ones are, to a greater or lesser extent – are also characterised by their territoriality. The territoriality of SAMUTER, according to different theoretical and disciplinary perspectives, in particular those formulated around Territorialised Agri-Food Systems (SAT) and Local Agri-Food Systems (SIAL), and by Alberto Magnaghi’s “territorialist approach”, is understood as the anchoring of these systems in the territory throughout the entire production cycle, in particular in the production and transformation phases, and, depending on the type and location of the production system, also in the distribution and consumption phases.

Precisely because of the territoriality of the SAMUTERs, their study in mainland and island Spain is addressed in this project in three major geographical contexts: (i) mountain and upland areas, where agro-livestock and forestry systems dominate; (ii) the large inland and coastal plains and countryside, areas where large monocultures, both rainfed and irrigated, are commonly planted; and (iii) metropolitan and urban regions, with a predominance of different types of peri-urban agriculture. These contexts imply differentiated agro-ecological bases and equally different systems of exploitation, transformation, distribution and consumption, as well as the formulation and implementation of specific public policies, mostly autonomous. Within these three large SAMUTER territorial groups, diverse agricultural landscapes are configured, organised and function according to distinct ecological, historical, socio-economic and cultural patterns, which make the landscapes an expression of the character, meaning and identity of each SAMUTER, and one of the foundations for renewed strategies of marketing.