How crop models and government visions foreclose imaginaries of agroecological futures

Against the backdrop of the ecological crisis, food production systems will need to transform to ensure future food security. There are contrasting visions of what this transformation should look like. This paper scrutinizes these competing imaginaries of future agriculture and associated styles of anticipation in Tanzania. We find that both government visions and global crop models anticipate futures in line with agricultural modernization; a food system driven by productivity and efficiency that is associated with adverse socio-ecological challenges. In contrast, an alternative imaginary transpires through the lived experiences and aspirations of small-holder farmers; an agroecological food system characterized by soil health, food quality and solidarity that is more in line with sustainability and justice. This lived future is overwritten by government visions and global crop models, which render the agroecological future unimaginable by abstracting and emptying the future. Our findings highlight that transformative change may not only be hindered by a ‘lack of imagination’, but rather the politics of anticipation through which existing radical visions become foreclosed. We propose diverse ways in which researchers may empower radical imaginaries that already exist among marginalized communities, including what this might mean for the future use of crop models. • Crop models and government visions reproduce dominant imaginaries of agricultural modernization, foreclosing agroecological futures • Agroecology has potential to spur sustainable and just agrarian change for smallholders • Researchers may empower agroecological imaginaries by supporting local knowledge and participatory visioning • Crop models can only enable sustainable agrarian change if they model and explore transformative farm systems.