This report argues that ideas around local food have played a key role in the 'great food debate' that has taken place in the UK over the last two decades and as such the local food movement has been extremely useful in raising awareness and helping to shape public discussion about the future of food.
At the same time, it is now apparent that the notion of 'sustainable food' has important advantages over local food for framing the next phase of the debate. The report defines sustainable food as food associated with high levels of well-being, social justice, stewardship and system resilience. In order to move towards more sustainable food the report argues that we must:
- Renew the commitment to address poverty and disadvantage in all their forms.
- Rethink our relationship with work, including issues of low pay and injustice, long commuting distances, gender and ethnic discrimination, resistance to 'family-friendly' work patterns and the 'long hours culture'.
- Reshape the places where we live so that we are less dependent on cars to access shops and other services and amenities.
- Reduce the environmental impacts of consumption.
In addition, government at all levels needs to develop and implement a coherent and integrated food policy that is directly and explicitly articulated with relevant economic, social, environmental, climate change and security policies. Specifically, it says that a new food policy must mount a full-scale attack on 'cheap food disease' which is now endemic to the food system and which manifests itself through labour exploitation, environmental degradation and diet-related ill-health.
This report may be accessed here.
(This is a pay sevice.)
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