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In the mid-1970s there was a widespread view that the full vertical integration of agriculture was occurring, with food production, distribution, and retailing coming to be organized on a global scale by the major food manufacturers such as Nestle, Heinz and Unilever. One large US conglomerate, Tenneco, claimed it would own and control all of its agri-food operations from ‘seedling to supermarket’(Anonymous 1975). The prospect of such a level of corporate control over the food industry created academic debate about: industry profiteering; the implications for consumer sovereignty of food industry mergers and acquisitions; the future role of the ‘family farmer’; and, the impacts on rural communities, consumers, and the environment (Bonanno et al. 1994; Heffernan et al. 1999; for Australia, see Burch and Lawrence 2005; Burch et al. 1996; Lawrence 1987; Lockie and Pritchard 2001). However, while the horizontal and …