Setting the Scene

Presenter: Cllr John McKay (SHDC)

Slides: | Setting the Scene open_in_new

UWE report for South Hams climate shows

• Hotter drier summers
• Warmer wetter winters Outcome: Clear need for
• Improved water storage
• Food production adaptation Devon Carbon Plan
• Reliance on Negative Emission technology is unproven at the scale required In order to reach Net Zero, 12% year on year emission reduction is required. Main emissions in South Hams from
• Housing (18%) - this requires government intervention
• Agriculture and Transport together make up 50% - and this is an area that we could make an impression on Many valuable projects in progress. How can the council help?
• £500k budget pa for next 4 years.
• Funding Support- eg access to public loan boards, UK shared prosperity funding, commitment to support communities and central government funds
• Policy and Projects
• Lobbying
• Working together Common goals: proposed (17m) Pathways to success: proposed The need for action: Existing C budget for 1.5 will be exhausted in 4 years. Extinction rate alarming. Dawn of IT (1980’s) connected with explosive rates CO2 production as supply chains lengthened. Can IT be a solution to supply chain issue whilst also addressing convenience, efficiencies in distribution and production

Power of Food Procurement and Lessons Learnt from SW Food Hub

Presenter: Greg Parsons and Glenn Willcock

Glen Willcock (Board Exeter University and Dep Chair Exeter College) set up Exeter City Futures in 2015 which brought together anchor institutions in Exeter with aim of Energy independent Congestion Free by 2025. Part of this consisted of creating a budget for change with the focus being on how the public sector spends money on procurement - especially on food.

Procurement professionals in anchor institutions are usually responsible for all aspects of procurement so focussing just on food is not possible.

In 2014, Greg Parsons was working for the French government (EDF at Hinkley Point) on local food procurement. Project proved local sourcing could be done at scale. Went to work with DEFRA ‘Plan for Public Procurement’

Greg and Glen then worked together (Dynamic Food Procurement CIC) to build a flexible technology solution bridging willing partners on both supply and demand sides. Concept was that the buyer could stipulate eg carrots with preference that they are supplied locally - but with assurance that order would be satisfied whatever. By year end a significant spend would have been diverted locally.

Willing buyers, producers and users had all been established, but despite this promising work at national level (Crown Commercial Services) and then subsequently at DCC level, efforts to fund the technology development fell through

Key learnings:

• Time is your enemy- people move on an individual's priorities change.
• Large scale intervention was too complex
• Do it fast and local
• Follow the energy! Look for organisations and people that want to do this.

Food Economy in the South Hams in 2033

Presenter: Andy Johnson

Slides: South Hams Food Economy open_in_new

Andy explored a South Hams in 2033 in which 10% of the food consumed by the 44k households had switched to local organic food. (presently <2%). He anticipated some of the things that had happened to make this possible, namely:

• Farmers wanted a change
• Technology connected consumers and producers direct
• Local councils were supporting “Keep It Local”
• Citizens had made the link between climate, nature and food
• Retailers had recognised competitive advantage of KIL
• A change of government!

Assuming 1700 ha converted to organic food production, (see presentation for rationale), the likely benefits were perceived as including (but not limited to:

• @280 FTE new jobs
• Carbon capture @2.7 tonnes pa for 44k households
• Better consider health and biodiversity

This future sees producers collaborating around physical and digital infrastructure and having a direct relationship with consumers. And it sees local authorities collaborating on procurement, supporting planning applications to support producers and supporting Keep It Local initiatives.

Role of Digital Solutions

Presenters: Peter Russel(Ooooby), Lynne Davis(Open Food Network), Marina O'Connell (Apricot Centre)

Slides: Role of Digital Solutions open_in_new

What do digital solutions provide ? A way of selling direct from farms to local businesses and consumers which levels the playing field, automates sales, simplifies operations and decentralises the food system. This potentially gives local food a huge advantage over the incumbent systems. Clear evidence that up to 40% of supply chain cost can be removed. Presently seeing food from Regen Farms with short supply chain moving to price parity as inflation hits distribution prices. Local food supply is much more resilient with things changing massively recently with more players providing digital solutions eg Big Barn, Open Food Network, Ooooby, Growing Good. Also big increases in food hubs recently where small producers share products, customers and distribution networks.

An good example being Apricot Centre. Apricot Centre - All food sold via a short supply chain within 25m radius. Thriving market stall, veg round with online shop (with fruit, meat and grain from other producers) through consumer interface with Ooooby (B2C solution). Pandemic proved this platform to be easily scalable. Also link to other food hubs in the Good Food Loop through the Open Food Network (B2B solution). Connective infrastructure needs to allow for range solutions, but platforms need to interconnect to prevent data silos.

Food Data Collaboration (Lynne Davis). Don't want a single platform as this creates fragility - need diverse creative businesses and a way to link data sharing. FDC has initial funding of £500k (National Lottery) to pilot data interchange based on the established Data Food Consortium (France). This protocol includes multiple platforms, notably shopify and is adopting a commons principles so that no one party owns the technology. The pilot phase is exploring three approaches:

1. Regional (Open Food Loop)
2. Depth first - Hodmedods to as many retailer as possible
3. Breadth first: working with Big Barn to get as many suppliers connected as possible.

Growing Communities Case Study

Presenter: Kerry Rankine (Growing Communities)

Slides: Growing Communities open_in_new

Community led NFP company, operating since 1996 in Hackney, E London.

Aim: to change food system both in terms of how we produce food, but also in terms of how we sell it by creating alternative routes to market, namely:

• Veg bag scheme (1996)
• All Organic farmers market (2003) which combined, now provides food for @8500 people from 23 growers. Growing Communities also:
• Train growers
• Grow food on 2 urban farms
• Run wholesale and networking company, Better Food Shed with the aims of creating more nature-friendly farmers and increasing access to this sort of food. Guiding principle: fair price to farmers.
• Also set up now independent, Better Food Traders Network, supporting small producers (Contact Lois Gallimore) Better Food Shed
• 20 tonnes food / week from 23 small organic producers within 70 miles of London through veg box schemes (inc their own), but also to schools and community groups.
• Buy in from large wholesalers to keep system going, esp in hungry months and when range limited

Distributing value through food by

• Fair pay to farmers
• Flexibility – take what’s in the fields
• Prompt payment to farmers
• Marketing by veg schemes to build customers understanding & support
• Low overheads
• Low operating costs
• Fair pay for staff (Real Living Wage)
• Low pay differential within GC (and BFS) = Not taking lots of money out of the system)

What impact does GC have?

• For every £1 spent, £3.07 with social, economic and environmentally benefits (New Economic Foundation research 2021)
• Farmers get 50% inc sales price, increased turnover, more employees
• Consumers have better access to good food and eat less processed food
• Social benefits of street markets with people feeling happier cf supermarkets

What would help ?

• SURVEY/MAP WHAT IS ALREADY THERE - please don't reinvent the wheel!
• INFRASTRUCTURE – SPACES & PLACES & STUFF
• SUBSIDY aka INVESTMENT - EG.SOCIAL RENTS
• PLANNING - prioritise these sort of businesses - where will these farm workers live?
• PROCUREMENT POLICIES - make sure policies aligned to favour local food

Closing thoughts: Mainstream supermarket system is efficient but not resilient or sustainable: UK fruit and veg consumption is reducing year on year, supermarkets have small profits on fresh food so farmers’ margins are getting smaller. The GC model can provide a template for building a local food system with fairness and resilience at heart whilst still protecting the local environment.

Liege Food Belt

Presenter: Christian Jonet

Slides: Leige Food Belt open_in_new

A review of the construction of a successful local, ecological and social food system.

First to be established in 2013 - now one of 5 food belts in Belgium. Started with a large community gathering(600 people) aiming to harness creativity and engagement. Q: what would it look like if at least 50% of our food is produced locally? Used Open Space Technology open_in_new to identify barriers that needed to be addressed, namely:

• Access to land
• Access to finance
• Training and business development support
• Create missing links in local food chains
• Partnerships development with municipalities
• Citizen awareness and involvement
• Logistics organisation

The event started a boom in 100 local food producers and 20 new co-operatives for production, processing and distribution What had to be done? (Examples of things that have worked well ):

• Citizen awareness: activity included “Feeding Festivals” which are 10 days long. Other towns are now copying.
• Mobilisation of stakeholders: Created Food Policy Council - an association between the Food Belt, university, the 24 municipalities (covering about 635k people) and 120 members representing all aspects of production, process, distributors, consumers etc. Liege city council has committed to all food coming from local organic suppliers by 2040.
• Schools involvement - healthy soup and smoothies replace sugary snacks. Community kitchens eg hospitals all part of council.

Addressing missing links in food chains: infrastructure investment required for: 1) logistics hub inc office and admin support for cooperatives in food belt 2) Cannery: Cooperation with local authorities for European funding. Central canning unit will enable 100% supply of veg to schools and hospitals.

Funding: Initial volunteer and cooperative investment proved an appetite and case for more funding. Institutional and public body investment followed. Annual budget of Food Belt team mainly wages - now employs 7 people with City helping with overheads.