A SWITCH of food systems for integral regeneration

In 2017, the United Nations body that assesses scientific knowledge related to the world’s food security and nutrition, the High Level Panel of Experts of Food Security and Nutrition (HLPE) of the Committee on World Food Security (CFR), sanctioned a definition of food systems still used by FAO. «All elements (environment, people, inputs, processes, infrastructure, institutions, etc.) and activities involved in the production, processing, distribution, preparation, and consumption of food, and the outcomes of these activities, including socio-economic and environmental outcomes».

Everyone can see how much this agglomeration, which far surpasses the concept of food alone, if nicked in even one of its parts, may be vulnerable to a general collapse due to unsustainable pressure from a steadily growing urban population, overexploitation of natural resources, increasing climate variability, environmental degradation, loss of biodiversity and social inequity. Add to this political uncertainty, market instability, and social insecurity due to the war that affects price increases, supply disruptions, and rising product prices: in short, new threats to food security, nutrition, natural resources, and social inclusion.

So, how to take action to protect food systems and, consequently, take care of «all the elements» mentioned by the HLPE?

Undoubtedly, through the integration of existing national programs and strategies and intergovernmental cooperation aimed at introducing a systems approach to food policy and, through continuous cross-sectoral dialogue involving all actors in food-related decision-making all while taking concrete steps to operationalize the goals set by individual governments and the 2030 Agenda.

All true. Yet, a strategy aimed at taking care of the food system cannot disregard an important transformative factor, largely independent of governmental and institutional actions: a change of mindset, which can only come from the spread of a broader awareness about food.

For there is never a chance to renew and regenerate a system — whether natural or human — without acting on each of the elements that are mutually interconnected and interact with each other or with the external environment. These elements include people: they are us, with our consciousness (or unconsciousness) about the enormous power of food as a factor of integral regeneration.

My experience leads me to state with conviction that even a single encounter, even a casual one, can bring about a radical change in our mentality, in the way we relate to food and everything related and unrelated to it.

It is true, however, that if you want to act on a large scale, you need to join projects that act precisely to concretely change mindsets, enhancing them.

The goal of the European project SWITCH, funded by Horizon Europe, in line with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), is to change the food systems of European citizens towards a just, healthy, and sustainable food transition through knowledge and innovation.

Extensive research, a scientific approach, and systematic use of technologies — along the entire food supply chain, from production to consumption — are the pathways by which SWITCH aims to spread and entrench a broader awareness and diffusion of healthy and sustainable food systems in the European Union; an improved understanding of the educational and accessibility gaps that limit the large-scale adoption of healthy food patterns for people (and, consequently, for the environment, for biodiversity, for society, for the economy). Sustainable diets — understood in the etymological sense of the term, from the Greek díaita: a way of life, and not just a list of foods — create sustainable and inclusive development models that do not have profit as their main goal, but the virtuous encounter between land and people.

Since its inception in January 2023, SWITCH aims to achieve this transition through a careful assessment of the socioeconomic, environmental, and nutritional dynamics of food production and consumption in individual territories, while also valuing their social, cultural, economic, environmental, and agronomic diversity. A diversity that must never be underestimated and repressed in favor of global diets and the adoption of tools, such as the Nutri-score, through which it is impossible to tell the complexity of the values that food represents.

For this reason, the strategic assets of SWITCH are Food Hubs representing the food systems of urban regions (CRFS); that is, as defined by FAO, «all the actors, processes and relationships that are involved in food production, processing, distribution and consumption in a given urban region». These are geographic regions — which include one or more urban centers, and their surrounding peri-urban and rural areas — through which people, food, goods, resources, ecosystem services, and all food system actors and activities flow. Across Europe there are six: Rome and the Lazio region; Berlin and the Brandenburg region; Montpellier and the Occitania region; Cagliari and the Sardinia region; Gothenburg and the Västra Götaland region; and San Sebastian and the Basque region.

Over four years, the Food Hubs and partners involved in the project — in a joint strategy of co-creating equitable and sustainable solutions for all consumers — aim to locally implement environmental, economic, and social sustainability; improve food models and related cultural approaches; and increase knowledge, awareness, and accessibility of the demand and supply of sustainable and healthy foods.

There are currently 20 partners involved in the project. Six Italian ones: CMCC; Future Food Institute; Agro Camera (ARM); pOsti; UNINA Federico II and UNICAMP and fourteen from all over Europe: BBC Innovation; DAS BAUMHAUS; IIASA; EPFL — École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne; Kutxa Fundazioa and Kutxa Ekogunea; LAORE; INRAE — Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environment; RISE — Research Institutes of Sweden; UPM; Wageningen University & Research; ZALF; Chalmers Sweden; BC3; Antistatique.

Looking at the dynamics of interaction between humans and their nourishment in relation to health, culture, and the environment, and considering the changes created by the use of new technologies and ongoing social transformations, it becomes clear that innovation must always be cultural first: because to be fully and truly realized, it must be based on changing mindsets. SWITCH is working exactly in that direction.

However, it should not be forgotten that enabling projects and platforms of this caliber must always be accompanied by training understood as integral human education, as Paideia: a continuous learning process that creates an intimate relationship between man and the environment, based on a relationship of absolute communion and co-creation of value.

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