Transforming Food Environments

We regularly find ourselves in food environments that promote the consumption of high fat and sugary foods rather than encouraging us to eat more fruit and vegetables. However, because of increased media attention, people are becoming more interested in alternative approaches to improving the many food-related decisions we make daily. Transforming Food Environments features evidence from several disciplines exploring initiatives that have improved food environments and discusses the importance of achieving success in equitable and sustainable ways. The book presents information on diverse food environments followed by methods that help readers become aware of the design of interventions and food policies. It covers food environments in schools, workplaces, and community centres as well as fast food establishments and food marketing. The book presents methods to help encourage better food choices and purchase of healthier foods. It explores persuasion tactics used by health professionals such as changing availability and/or price, using nudging techniques, and food labelling. Led by Editor Charlotte Evans, Associate Professor of Nutritional Epidemiology and Public Health Nutrition at the University of Leeds; and written by an international range of authors from countries including the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and the United Kingdom, this multidisciplinary book appeals to students, researchers, public health professionals and policy makers. It also raises awareness and provides a comprehensive treatment of the importance of our environments on food choice.

We regularly find ourselves in food environments that promote the consumption of high fat and sugary foods rather than encouraging us to eat more fruit and vegetables. However, because of increased media attention, people are becoming more interested in alternative approaches to improving the many food-related decisions we make daily. Transforming Food Environments features evidence from several disciplines exploring initiatives that have improved food environments and discusses the importance of achieving success in equitable and sustainable ways. The book presents information on diverse food environments followed by methods that help readers become aware of the design of interventions and food policies. It covers food environments in schools, workplaces, and community centres as well as fast food establishments and food marketing. The book presents methods to help encourage better food choices and purchase of healthier foods. It explores persuasion tactics used by health professionals such as changing availability and/or price, using nudging techniques, and food labelling. Led by Editor Charlotte Evans, Associate Professor of Nutritional Epidemiology and Public Health Nutrition at the University of Leeds; and written by an international range of authors from countries including the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and the United Kingdom, this multidisciplinary book appeals to students, researchers, public health professionals and policy makers. It also raises awareness and provides a comprehensive treatment of the importance of our environments on food choice.

Drawing on studies from Africa, Asia and South America, this book provides empirical evidence and conceptual explorations of the gendered dimensions of food security. It investigates how food security and gender inequity are conceptualized within interventions, assesses the impacts and outcomes of gender-responsive programs on food security and gender equity and addresses diverse approaches to gender research and practice that range from descriptive and analytical to strategic and transformative. The chapters draw on diverse theoretical perspectives, including transformative learning, feminist theory, deliberative democracy and technology adoption. As a result, they add important conceptual and empirical material to a growing literature on the challenges of gender equity in agricultural production. A unique feature of this book is the integration of both analytic and transformative approaches to understanding gender and food security. The analytic material shows how food security interventions enable women and men to meet the long-term nutritional needs of their households, and to enhance their economic position. The transformative chapters also document efforts to build durable and equitable relationships between men and women, addressing underlying social, cultural and economic causes of gender inequality. Taken together, these combined approaches enable women and men to reflect on gendered divisions of labor and resources related to food, and to reshape these divisions in ways which benefit families and communities. Co-published with the International Development Research Centre.

The coronavirus pandemic has upended local, national, and global food systems, and put the Sustainable Development Goals further out of reach. But lessons from the world’s response to the pandemic can help address future shocks and contribute to food system change. In the 2021 Global Food Policy Report, IFPRI researchers and other food policy experts explore the impacts of the pandemic and government policy responses, particularly for the poor and disadvantaged, and consider what this means for transforming our food systems to be healthy, resilient, efficient, sustainable, and inclusive. Chapters in the report look at balancing health and economic policies, promoting healthy diets and nutrition, strengthening social protection policies and inclusion, integrating natural resource protection into food sector policies, and enhancing the contribution of the private sector. Regional sections look at the diverse experiences around the world, and a special section on finance looks at innovative ways of funding food system transformation. Critical questions addressed include: - Who felt the greatest impact from falling incomes and food system disruptions caused by the pandemic? - How can countries find an effective balance among health, economic, and social policies in the face of crisis? - How did lockdowns affect diet quality and quantity in rural and urban areas? - Do national social protection systems such as cash transfers have the capacity to protect poor and vulnerable groups in a global crisis? - Can better integration of agricultural and ecosystem polices help prevent the next pandemic? - How did companies accelerate ongoing trends in digitalization and integration to keep food supply chains moving? - What different challenges did the pandemic spark in Asia, Africa, and Latin America and how did these regions respond?

This open access book examines the interactions between India’s economic development, agricultural production, and nutrition through the lens of a “Food Systems Approach (FSA).” The Indian growth story is a paradoxical one. Despite economic progress over the past two decades, regional inequality, food insecurity and malnutrition problems persist. Simultaneously, recent trends in obesity along with micro-nutrient deficiency portend to a future public health crisis. This book explores various challenges and opportunities to achieve a nutrition-secure future through diversified production systems, improved health and hygiene environment and greater individual capability to access a balanced diet contributing to an increase in overall productivity. The authors bring together the latest data and scientific evidence from the country to map out the current state of food systems and nutrition outcomes. They place India within the context of other developing country experiences and highlight India’s status as an outlier in terms of the persistence of high levels of stunting while following global trends in obesity. This book discusses the policy and institutional interventions needed for promoting a nutrition-sensitive food system and the multi-sectoral strategies needed for simultaneously addressing the triple burden of malnutrition in India.

Western democratic welfare states often featured sectoral governance arrangements where governments negotiated policy with sectoral elites, based on shared ideas and exclusive institutional arrangements. Food and agriculture policy is widely considered an extreme case of compartmentalized and ‘exceptionalist’ policy-making, where sector-specific policy ideas and institutions provide privileged access for sectoral interest groups and generate policies that benefit their members. In the last two decades, policy exceptionalism has been under pressure from internationalization of policy-making, increasing interlinkage of policy areas and trends towards self-regulation, liberalization and performance-based policies. This book introduces the concept of ‘post-exceptionalism’ to characterize an incomplete transformation of exceptionalist policies and politics which preserves significant exceptionalist features. Post-exceptional constellations of ideas, institutions, interests and policies can be complementary and stable, or tense and unstable. Food and agriculture policy serves as an example to illustrate an incomplete transformation towards a more open, contested and networked politics. Chapters on agricultural policy-making in the European Union and the United States, the politics of food in Germany and the United Kingdom, transnational organic standard setting and global food security debates demonstrate how ‘postexceptionalism’ helps to understand the co-existence of transformation and path dependency in contemporary public policies. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of the Journal of European Public Policy.

How can huge populations be fed healthily, equitably and affordably while maintaining the ecosystems on which life depends? The evidence of diet’s impact on public health and the environment has grown in recent decades, yet changing food supply, consumer habits and economic aspirations proves hard. This book explores what is meant by sustainable diets and why this has to be the goal for the Anthropocene, the current era in which human activities are driving the mismatch of humans and the planet. Food production and consumption are key drivers of transitions already underway, yet policy makers hesitate to reshape public eating habits and tackle the unsustainability of the global food system. The authors propose a multi-criteria approach to sustainable diets, giving equal weight to nutrition and public health, the environment, socio-cultural issues, food quality, economics and governance. This six-pronged approach to sustainable diets brings order and rationality to what either is seen as too complex to handle or is addressed simplistically and ineffectually. The book provides a major overview of this vibrant issue of interdisciplinary and public interest. It outlines the reasons for concern and how actors throughout the food system (governments, producers, civil society and consumers) must engage with (un)sustainable diets.

This edited volume builds on existing alternative food initiatives and food movements research to explore how a systems approach can bring about health and well-being through enhanced collaboration. Chapters describe the myriad ways community-driven actors work to foster food systems that are socially just, embed food in local economies, regenerate the environment and actively engage citizens. Drawing on case studies, interviews and Participatory Action Research projects, the editors share the stories behind community-driven efforts to develop sustainable food systems, and present a critical assessment of both the tensions and the achievements of these initiatives. The volume is unique in its focus on approaches and methodologies that both support and recognize the value of community-based practices. Throughout the book the editors identify success stories, challenges and opportunities that link practitioner experience to critical debates in food studies, practice and policy. By making current practices visible to scholars, the volume speaks to people engaged in the co-creation of knowledge, and documents a crucial point in the evolution of a rapidly expanding and dynamic sustainable food systems movement. Entrenched food insecurity, climate change induced crop failures, rural-urban migration, escalating rates of malnutrition related diseases, and aging farm populations are increasingly common obstacles for communities around the world. Merging private, public and civil society spheres, the book gives voice to actors from across the sustainable food system movement including small businesses, not-for-profits, eaters, farmers and government. Insights into the potential for market restructuring, knowledge sharing, planning and bridging civic-political divides come from across Canada, the United States and Mexico, making this a key resource for policy-makers, students, citizens, and practitioners.