Latest from EU Member States
Ernährungsrat: The democratic potential of Food Policy Councils in Germany
Part 2 in democratising local food policy: we look to Germany and the democratic potential of Food Policy Councils. […]
sustainable food systems
Latest from EU Member States
France | Democratising Food Policy – Tweaking The Financial Toolbox
How can a top-down tool such as France’s Territorial Food Programmes help to democratise local food policy? How does the French infrastructure compare to Germany’s Food Policy Councils? In the best case scenario, communities take food into their own hands. Part 1 of a policy analysis by the Rural Resilience project. […]
Latest from EU Member States
Good Food Good Farming | People Across Europe Demand Better Food Systems!
As the European Commission is expected to publish a proposal for a Sustainable Food Systems Law in the autumn, Good Food Good Farming launched Food for Talk: days of dialogue that highlight the voices of farmers, fishers, activists and citizens. In a participatory video, the movement now calls for #GoodFood4EU through an ambitious law proposal. Report by Good Food Good Farming. […]
Latest from EU Member States
Reconnect With Beans – Take Our Food Power Back
If we all agree to take back the power over our food, what do we need? Helping to frame the discussion at the Global Bean Seed Festival, Xavier Hamon, artisan cook and partner of the Rural Resilience project, encourages us to re-cultivate hundreds of varieties of grains and pulses, take back land, win political mandates, and most of all, support those who work for the living world, day after day. Words : Xavier Hamon. […]
Latest from EU Member States
Op-Ed | Europe Eats the World
“Europe feeds the world” is a line often heard in EU policy debates and the media. A line often used to sideline calls to lower the impacts of European agriculture and to place “providing food” as the highest political priority. But is this line really true? In this op-ed lead author, Jabier Ruiz, of the WWF European Policy Office, summarises the main pieces of evidence gathered, which show that, far from feeding the world, Europe consumes more than its fair share. […]
Latest from EU Member States
France | Cooking Up Fairer Food & Farming Part 1
For Xavier Hamon, the term ‘chef’ is problematic. It fosters an unfair power dynamic between the person who produces the food and the person who cooks the food. Yet farmers and cooks are often up against the same challenges. Xavier is a founding member of the Slow Food Cooks Alliance, a partner of Nos Campagnes en Résilience. He favours a cooperative rather than a competitive approach to food – to the benefit of all involved. In conversation with Valérie Geslin. […]
Latest from EU Member States
Letter From The Farm | Investing In The Future
We’re back on Zsámboki Biokert organic market garden in Hungary, where Matthew and Kata Hayes and the team are taking time to plan for the year ahead. January was a time to reflect on the year gone by, and the conscious effort that the farm is making to invest in the next generation, and to encourage young people to think about our food systems. In these uncertain times for micro-scale farmers, and for farming in general, Covid has driven home the need to build and maintain community and common values, writes Matthew. […]
Latest from the ARC network
Time To Rethink ‘Plant-Based’ – Part 1
‘Plant-based’ is the new ‘sustainable’. Marketed as the remedy to many of our crises, on closer inspection the label means little. And worse, rather than helping us to respect planetary boundaries, it embeds a belief that we can continue to consume because plants are a forever-giving source of food, fibre and fuel. In the first of a two-part series, Stuart Meikle debunks the reductionist virtues of ‘plant-based’ products. […]
Latest from the ARC network
COP26 | Corporations Team Up With CSOs To Push Big Data Solutions For Sustainable Food & Farming Systems
Food and farming is notable by its almost total absence from climate change discussions at COP26. Yet farmers can and want to be part of the solution. Could big data be the key to unlocking a transition to sustainble farming and food systems? An unlikely alliance of multinational corporations and civil society organisations makes the case for a Global Farm Metric. Ursula Billington reports. […]
Latest from the ARC network
Farming Bounded By Our Biological Boundaries – Part 4
Feeding the soil and avoiding fossil fuels is the Holy Grail of sustainable farming. Techno-solutions aside, this will entail working with nature by mimicking nature – and harnessing the capabilities of ruminants. In the final installment of this series, Stuart Meikle outlines solutions for fossil fuel-free farming. […]
Latest from the ARC network
Farming Bounded By Our Biological Boundaries – Part 3
It’s tempting to blame burping cows for methane emissions. But while nature cannot distinguish between naturally occurring methane and methane derived from fossil fuels and anthropological activity, humans can – and should. Methane has a role to play in sustainable farming. We cannot let the debate around methane emissions cloud the broader benefits of farming with ruminants, argues Stuart Meikle in part three of this series. […]
Latest from the ARC network
Farming Bounded By Our Biological Boundaries – Part 2
Despite the climate change mitigation emphasis on carbon sequestration, building soil carbon is first about food security, second about atmospheric carbon drawdown. By working with nature’s natural cycles to provide nutritious food with a low environmental footprint, Regenerative Agriculture will provide the transition from fossil-fuelled agro-chemistry to utilizing the farm’s natural resources, argues Stuart Meikle in the second part of this series. […]
Latest from the ARC network
Farming Bounded By Our Biological Boundaries – Part 1
Few people realize how their food comfort zone is shrinking. Where we are now is the starting point for an ecologically and biologically-based agricultural revolution. And it starts with the soil. We must adopt an ecosystem approach to identify sustainable food systems that can exist within our planet’s boundaries, argues Stuart Meikle in the first of a four-part series. […]
Latest from the ARC network
Carbon Starvation – A Crisis Of Our Time?
Are we beginning to see carbon – the fundamental building block of all life – as a pollutant? Instead of demonising carbon as a cause of climate breakdown, we need to restore balance in the natural carbon cycle that has been disrupted by the use of artificial fertilisers. In advance of his upcoming series on farming within planetary boundaries, Stuart Meikle offers a primer on the complex role of carbon in our soils. […]
Latest from key partners
“It’s More A Call To ‘Armies’ Than Arms” – Interview with Pat Mooney, Lead Author of ‘A Long Food Movement’
In this exclusive interview, Ursula Billington speaks to Pat Mooney, co-founder and executive director of the ETC Group, expert with IPES-Food, and lead author of the new report ‘A Long Food Movement: Transforming Food Systems by 2045’. Adamant that we can find opportunity in crisis, Pat shares his insights on Grey Swan events, grassroots versus global strategies, and building muscle to fight for change together. […]