Food

What is the "Food System"?

The concept of a food system challenges traditional understandings of a "simple, linear chain from farm to table."

Instead, the UN Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) describes how "Food systems encompass the entire range of actors and their interlinked value-adding activities involved in the production, aggregation, processing, distribution, consumption, and disposal of food products that originate from agriculture, forestry, or fisheries, and parts of the broader economic, societal and natural environments in which they are embedded."

The FAO further notes how the food system is "composed of sub-systems" like the waste management system, and interacts with other "key systems" such as the energy system and health system, contributing to its non-linearity and complex nature.

• The benefit of this complex definition: there exist many avenues to influence positive systems change within the food system!

Insecurity and Inequity in the Food System

Despite the existence of this complex and interconnected network, in the city of Cincinnati alone, more than 270,000 families experience food insecurity each year. This insecurity is partially attributable to the prevalence of "food deserts," wherein a "significant percentage of the population does not have access to grocery stores or supermarkets."

Recently, actors in the food systems space have observed a more complex system of "food apartheid," that considers the "root causes of poor access to health, nutrient-dense foods by communities of color and low-income white people."

• Notably, they observe that "Food deserts are attributed to food apartheid and have root causes in food insecurity, racial segregation, proximity to supermarkets, access to a vehicle, and various other social factors."

How Can Food Systems Be More Socially, Environmentally, and Economically Resilient?

In the context of food insecurity and the impacts of climate change, some methods to increase food systems resiliency could include...

• Promoting climate-smart agricultural practices
• Expanding farm to school programs
• Encouraging Community Supported Agriculture
• Increase composting access and education
• And MUCH MORE!

Green Umbrella's Greater Cincinnati Regional Food Policy Council (FPC)

The FPC is a network of food systems advocates from across Greater Cincinnati creating a socially, environmentally, and economically resilient regional food system together through policy and systems change.

FPC programs work across sectors to share learnings, build regional capacity and resource accessibility, amplify stories of food system transformation, and advocate policy change.

The FPC convenes and connects a broad network of food systems leaders on a number of Policy Committees, facilitated by annually selected FPC Council members. Through advocacy and action, these committees advance the FPC's key priorities, which include:

• Farms & Land Use
• Access & Education
• Infrastructure
• Institutions

To further these priorities and consider how they are integrated with climate, nutrition, and more, the FPC is developing methods to collect, compile and share knowledge-building information while centering people's lived experience. Additionally, the FPC supports farm to institution supply chains, offering numerous benefits to regional human, environmental, and economic well-being.

To learn more about the council's work or how to become a FPC committee member, yourself, visit the Greater Cincinnati Regional Food Policy Council website!