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The Dialogue concluded that due diligence can be an efficient tool to achieve sustainable supply chains and reduce trade-offs between agriculture and forests, when implemented correctly. Country experiences, and the lessons shared by other invitees demonstrated that Government’s support is critical to boost initiatives undertaken by the private sector, in order to achieve deforestation-free supply chains. Setting up tools that facilitate stakeholder engagement and dialogue among all the participants of the value chain, from producers to industrials and traders, and including the civil societ... Read morey and public authorities, can be a key for success. Special efforts should also be made to spread technologies to improve traceability and national forest information systems, but also improve the development of platforms to facilitate information exchange. Regarding the possibility of regulatory frameworks making due diligence compulsory, participants stressed that legislation should apply to all players along the value chain to ensure sufficient traceability and transparency. Progress has already been realized in some countries, supply chains and existing systems, which demonstrates why products that are not linked to deforestation should be acknowledged by new regulations. The Dialogue also insisted on the importance of fixing practical aspects like definitions of monitoring and reporting methods (harmonized indicators and criteria for disclosure) to ensure policy effectiveness in halting deforestation. It concluded on the possibility to build upon the numerous existing initiatives, highlighting the urgent need to support small and medium producers and market participants to integrate the dynamics of responsible business conduct favorable to forests. Read less

The Dialogue examined how due diligence processes in the agricultural sector can help to reduce risks of deforestation and other related adverse impacts on people and forests. This focus corresponds particularly with Action Track 3 of the Food Systems Summit – Boost Nature-Positive Production. It was driven by three expected outcomes: provide an overview of existing guidance for private sector due diligence in agriculture and emerging legislative requirements in consumer countries to ensure responsible business conduct/due diligence in agricultural supply chains as they relate to forests and... Read more climate change; share experiences and lessons learned from producer countries’ experiences improving due diligence and traceability in the agriculture and forestry sectors; identify needs for technical support to actors in producer countries to effectively respond to emerging measures and strategically attract responsible investment. Read less

During the dialogue all stakeholders agreed that consumers need to be involved and listened to throughout this process of transforming the food system. Younger generations that are more value driven and that will be most impacted by the change must be enabled and empowered to build solutions. Yet, participants also acknowledged that many consumers are not in a position to make the right choices. Thus, to what degree can consumers really drive this transformation? To what extent should regulatory bodies and food manufactures be driving this transformation by influencing consumer behavior? To ad... Read moredress the global food system challenges, food should be simultaneously nutritious and healthy, tasteful, sustainable, affordable and adapted to the local context. However, it is likely that new innovations will not be able to solve all these constraints at once. So, the question is which innovations should be prioritized? Participants had some diverging views on this, and the consensus reached was that we need to act on all fronts at the same time. Read less

Plant-based diets While many things need to change for consumers to shift their dietary patterns to healthier and more sustainable diets, an element that should never be compromised is taste: food must be tasty or it will not be accepted. Expanding the supply of nutritious plant-based products and diversifying protein sources were mentioned as strategies to improve the health of people and the planet. Several elements must change to achieve the shift in consumer attitudes and habits towards plant-based diets: 1) a wide range of choices with diverse protein sources, 2) better and transparent co... Read moremmunication from producers and government to consumers and 3) plant-based alternatives must achieve price parity with meat. To do this, food producers should take responsibility for producing nutritionally high-quality products with a focus on increasing protein sources diversity. In addition, greater cooperation, and co-creation is needed across the value chain from farm to fork to understand the barriers that prevent farmers from producing plant-based proteins and for plant-based diets to become mainstream among consumers. Government support as well as an overall enabling environment are key to helping to address some of these barriers. In fact, some of the negative perception of plant-based alternative to animal-based products related to processing could be diminished with better communication, transparency, and education. All these changes must be culturally accepted and seen in cultural context. Solutions need to be tailored to local culture, context, taste, feasibility, and affordability (particularly in developing countries). Innovation that allows for greater food personalization could be game-changing. Read less

Climate action, responsible consumption and production In today’s world there is so much that needs to be considered when grocery shopping: is the product nutritious and healthy? Is it sustainable? Consumers need to have the right information to make the right choices. An efficient way of doing so is through index scores which capture several basic indicators in a simple and easy to understand measure – examples include “Nutri-score” and “Eco-score”. Yet, how to define the optimal criteria remains an open question. As things currently stand, the easiest and best way to have a posit... Read moreive impact on climate change through their food consumption is 1) for consumers to shifting away from meat-based diets in high income countries with excessive consumption; and 2) for producers to better utilize crops by-products. For instance, 1 kg of coffee yields 2-3 kg of coffee pulp which is currently being wasted. Nonetheless, an assessment at the local level needs to be carried out to validate that by-products use does not lead to negative environmental impacts and/or downstream cultural changes. Read less

Industry, infrastructure, and innovation To kick-start the food system transform we need 1) a holistic and transparent assessment of the costs and value added across each step of the food supply chain. This includes the quantification of “hidden” environmental, sustainability and social aspects. This assessment will be critical to identifying the priority areas for the food system transformation. Then, 2) identify appropriate solutions taking a comprehensive approach since big impact can only be achieved with scale. Innovators will need to assess the food system through various lenses, inc... Read moreluding people who do not have access to sufficient and nutritious food when identifying these global solutions. Yet 3) we need to acknowledge that the implementation of identified solutions will differ depending on the local context. For example, while consumers in the developed world can pay more, those in developing countries cannot and “hidden” costs may need to be absorbed into the food supply chain. The ecosystem in Switzerland is broad - start-ups, academia, food retailers, technology, pharma - and has the capabilities to develop innovative solutions to the challenges faced by the food system. Greater collaboration on concrete projects among these actors is needed. The Swiss Food & Nutrition Valley can be “the glue” of this ecosystem but support from the government is critical, too. Read less

Good health and wellbeing The first element that is needed is more scientific knowledge on healthy diets. We do not know enough about what defines and characterizes a healthy diet or what it means to stay healthy. We need to 1) build and leverage innovative tools to measure health and healthy diets at a personal level (methodologies, metrics, biomarkers…); 2) invest in longer term impact science; and 3) broader more efficient consumer education and communication around food to drive behaviors towards healthy and sustainable diets. “Food education” should be broad in scope and encompass n... Read moreutrition, cooking, and sensory testing – an idea in this respect would be integrating nutrition and cooking classes in school curricula. We need innovative communication methods to translate complex science and biology in a way that is easily understood by the average consumer and in a way that encourages consumer’s engagement and interest. The consumer should be involved or even co-create these activities. Overall, as mentioned above, in order to achieve sustainable and healthy diets in 2030, all stakeholders need to play a role: consumers, industry, healthcare community, regulatory agencies… It’s about being consumer driven and consumer driving at the same time. Read less

Nutrition and affordability We need to 1) move away from increasing food quantity to increasing the quantity of quality food (avoiding excess of high sugar, salt or fat and adding more positive ingredients, e.g. micronutrients or fiber) according to Food-Based Dietary Guidelines and 2) further broaden the offer of nutritious plant-based products to divert from animal-based products (especially in high income countries). A big challenge is the difference in nutritional gaps between Low- and Middle-Income Countries versus High Income Countries. Part of the solution to close the gap is to improve... Read more Low- and Middle-Income Countries through partnerships in capacity building programs such as the Africa Leadership Initiative that foster collaboration and knowledge sharing across countries and stakeholder groups (business, government, academia and civil society). Read less

The Food System requires a transformation towards healthier diets for people produced in a way that maintains and replenishes natural resources. The scale and urgency of transformation needed requires everyone to join and play an active role: no individual or company is too small or too big to contribute to this transformation. A system approach with innovation at its core is needed. Yet, as the world looks for solutions, there are still many elements that need to be better understood in order to achieve an effective collaboration and co-creation across the value chain from fork to farm. - Wha... Read moret is a food system? Many people talk about it but not many understand all its complexities which must include the economic and cultural aspects of scalable solutions. -What is a sustainable healthy diet? We do need to consider all dimensions: nutrition and health, economical dimension (affordability), social and cultural components (taste, pleasure, experience), and environmental sustainability. -What is the true cost of food? A holistic assessment of our food system, including environmental and social externalities, is necessary to understand where along the value chain lies the biggest potential for innovation / transformation. It would constitute a roadmap for food system transformation to be implemented considering the local context. An additional, complementary angle is to think at what concretely needs to change so that we will be producing and consuming sustainable and healthy diets in 2030. -We need product level innovation that considers the multiple characteristics of food: nutrition and health, taste, sustainability, and affordability. Food producers need to develop nutritionally high-quality products without compromising on taste and increasing diversity, particularly in terms of protein sources. -Consumers need to shift towards healthy, nutritious, and plant-based diets. This requires consumer education and the earlier we learn the better: nutrition and cooking classes should be part of school curricula while consumer communication should be clearer and more compelling. Translating complex science and biology in a way that the layman can understand it and is willing to listen to, linking it to trendy topics or lifestyles such as yoga… -New personalized tools to measure and assess health and healthy diets (which would include new methodologies, metrics, biomarkers…) should also be part of the solution. -The young generation needs to be enabled and empowered to bring their own ideas and build solutions. -Globalization and de-globalization are happening in parallel. Innovations need to be relevant, affordable, and adaptable to the local context without creating new environmental impacts downstream or cultural shifts. Stakeholders should take a medium to long term view when assessing the feasibility of innovations. Local sourcing, reducing food losses or food upcycling are promising strategies. We can’t just wait for consumers, farmers or producers to change, we have to start changing all together. The food system transformation needs to be consumer driven and driving consumers at the same time. As we move this agenda forward, we should not forget how crucial it is to enable and empower the young generation to be part of building solutions. One challenge is that younger generations in many parts of the world do not want to develop their careers in agriculture. Today’s young people believe that agriculture is a sector filled with outdated approaches, led by older generations and little future prospects. Agriculture as a sector needs a new culture that appeals to the mindset and ways of working of the next generations. How can we make the agricultural sector open and accessible, collaborative, entrepreneurial, purposeful, and impactful as well as community-oriented? Read less

The dialogue theme was ‘Innovation for Food System Transformation’. The discussion examined what needs to change so that we are producing and consuming sustainable and healthy diets by 2030 with relevance to the Swiss and global context. As well as how innovation can help to achieve these changes. In fact, the role of innovation is critical and will only rise in importance with the onset of climate change.

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The Dialogue concluded that the reduction of land use change and promotion of ‘forest positive’ agriculture is critical to addressing the interlinked challenges of climate change, biodiversity, food security and global health. Country experiences, and the lessons shared by countries and subject matter experts alike, demonstrated that integrated landscape governance approaches and multistakeholder action is necessary to decouple deforestation from commodity production. The Dialogue found that governments have a key role to play in enabling forest positive commodity value chains, in four mai... Read moren action areas: 1) Enabling environment and enforcement of legality, 2) Transparent data and collaborative monitoring frameworks, 3) Capacity development and knowledge generation, and 4) Incentives and markets for forest positive agricultural products. The Dialogue further concluded that all stakeholders, and governments in particular, should keep in mind the following lessons in the development and implementation of their national pathways for food systems transformation: - There is a role for all actors (governments, private sector, civil society, communities) in halting deforestation in agriculture supply chains; concerted efforts and a multistakeholder approach that reconciles conflicting demands and seeks a common agenda is vital; - Policy alignment, cross-sectoral government coordination and collaboration is a key enabling factor, and must be institutionalized, including through national budgets; - Integrated land use planning, inclusion of farmers, local communities and indigenous peoples, and the security of tenure rights are important enabling conditions for sustainable public and private investment; - Sustained technical support and capacity development is crucial to supporting the adoption of forest positive production models; - Shared monitoring and information systems can be useful tools for planning and keeping track of progress made; - Finance (including incentives and innovative financing modalities) is necessary to fund food systems transformation. Read less

The Dialogue examined what role governments play in implementing integrated landscape approaches, which are key to advancing inclusive forest positive agriculture. This focus corresponds directly with Action Track 3 of the Food Systems Summit – Boost Nature-Positive Production. It was driven by four expected outcomes: - provide an overview of strategic trade-offs among forest conservation, sustainable forest and land management, food security, agricultural policies, climate change mitigation and adaptation; - share experiences and lessons learned from countries’ efforts to design and imple... Read morement integrated landscape approaches for forest-positive agriculture and to align agricultural policies and investments to forest conservation and sustainable land management; - identify what role governments can play in advancing inclusive forest-positive agriculture through integrated landscape approaches, and how REDD+ is supporting these approaches; and - introduce the upcoming FAO technical paper on these topics. Read less

There were no areas of divergence that emerged during our Dialogue. Participants respected each other's contributions and built on them throughout the event.

Our second topic included Topsoil Loss and Rejuvenation. Participants discussed the need for greater access to information regarding topsoil loss and methods of rejuvenating topsoil. Participants further discussed the degradation of topsoil through poor farming techniques and the overuse of agrochemicals and fertilizers. Food contamination due to poor farm management (such as an overabundance of arsenic in rice) is of grave concern. So too, the loss of small farms due to corporate farming (bullying, manipulation) is a shared concern. Lastly, the impact of climate change on growing seasons and ... Read morethe types of products are problematic. With the monopoly of monocultures on food production, climate change will further degrade biodiversity, and the impact of that loss on humanity is yet fully realized. Read less

Our initial topic, Food Waste, discussed the slow rise of Zero Waste restaurants, the importance of composting, and farm subsidies offered for those who produce and do not produce food. There is an interest in potential public policies, including a tax credit for small food producers or composting. Bills introduced in the US House of Representatives (HR 4443 and HR 4444) move in this direction, although they have little chance of becoming policy. We noted that consumers aren't familiar with their options or how to address food waste personally. More targeted educational material would help inf... Read moreorm consumers of potential courses of action and choices. Finally, participants identified the confusion of US food labeling, which could better educate consumers on how long food is edible, not just a "best by" date. Read less

Numerous findings emerged from our Dialogue highlighting (1) the need for integrity in food systems, (2) better policies that protect consumers (and a clearinghouse to track those policies), (3) a means to address the corporate destruction of small and medium farms, (3) the containment of GMO related practices to prevent bullying of non-GMO practices, (4) consideration of a tax credit from embracing a wild aesthetic, as opposed to mowing public land, (5) the need for a concerted effort to revitalize land and topsoil NOW, and (6) the containment of city sprawl that destroys natural habitat.

Chipco Preserve's Food Systems Dialogue was organized around the "shift to sustainable consumption patterns." We first considered methods of addressing food waste. We then discussed how the loss of topsoil will impact the future. We followed up with methods and considerations for rejuvenating topsoil to improve food systems outcomes.

The participants of the independent dialogue agreed that there is an urgent need to ensure that breastfeeding is recognized by all as the first sustainable food system. To do that we need to transform system values to recognise the value of women’s contribution and the environment, and address the time poverty of women 1. Firstly, we need to change the underlying values of the food system as well as on other systems Such as health and employment which have failed to value women and out of date patriarchal systems which deplete women and the environment and exploit animals, and fail to value ... Read morewomen’s work, and ensure all have sufficient time budgets to enjoy free time Hold governments health professionals and systems and companies accountable for failure to protect the breastfeeding food system 2. Secondly we need to find new ways to hold governments health professionals and Health Systems and companies accountable will filing to protect promote and support breastfeeding or even recognize its value we must do this through insisting by invest in and resource baby friendly hospital initiative code compliance and enforcement and I to collection and a specially in the digital could see a code compliance should be like tobacco advertising they should also be obstacles removed in the Health System during COVID and action taken to end breaches of the who code through digital marketing Organise and align to make strong demands on duty bearers 3. There needs to be stronger demands made and wider sharing in society responsibility for breastfeeding to a larger range of groups whilst also an invigorating and Resourcing, renew grass roots action and sharing knowledge, and identify and create political champions for change such as for baby friendly hospitals, code implementation, maternity entitlements , whilst using economic research to identify and raise awareness of the dollars given to industry against breastfeeding, as well as the costs of not breastfeeding Women to be resourced adequately for their productive roles in the Food System 4. Women are resilient but need to be resourced so that may have real ‘choices’ as consumers as workers and as citizens. They are not a ‘free’ or cheap resource, and are depleted. This means that there needs to be a universal basic income and maternity entitlements and adequate resourcing of their needs as producers of care and food for infants and young children Get industry out of government 5. The power of industry in international and government policymaking must be ended, especially in the area of breastfeeding because the companies want to shape the tastes of young consumers from birth towards junk food making them a consumer for life. Nowhere is this more evident than in Codex Alimentarius, and the use of Codex standards to make unnecessary products (like follow up and growing up milks) marketable must stop. Governments are for citizens but have become agents of corporations trying to hold down prices/wages of small producers and women workers to increase profits, rather than improve People’s nutrition and food security and the environment in which they live their lives. Baby food marketing to policymakers is part of industry influence that must end including via UN agencies partnering with food and pharma companies. Level the marketing playing field for breastfeeding by stopping baby food marketing at every level Stop the marketing power of industry by enforcing compliance with strong regulation of baby food marketing, and by fully funding citizens groups to deliver comprehensive grassroots marketing and promotion of breastfeeding as the first food system in order to develop restore and protect breastfeeding cultures and enable environments. The industry has immense power to shape social culture and undermine breastfeeding and there is an urgent need to stop their influence of messaging in ways that are harmful to breastfeeding. Also, we need to reclaim the language and stop the marketing through regulation and through. Read less