The Food Foundation Podcast

Alice English, project manager at The Food Foundation is just back from the Houses of Parliament where she and the team have been asking growers, NGOs and MPs how we can boost fruit and vegetable production and consumption in the UK.As the Government develops its new Horticulture Strategy for England, The Food Foundation and SHEFs global research consortium have been analysing what mix of policies might support greater consumption and production of fruit and vegetables. Alice reflects on how the event went, what she took away and where we go from here.Click here for the link to the Food Foundation briefings Alice mentions, and here for episode 10 of The Food Foundation podcast on why we urgently need a horticultural strategy. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dr Annie Connolly, Research and Engagement Lead at the Food Foundation, introduces us to Fix our Food, a project aiming to transform the food system in Yorkshire. As part of its work, a ground-breaking research and transformational programme, being led by the Food Foundation's Young Food Ambassadors, is currently investigating access to healthy and sustainable options for children who receive Free School Meals. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, we're celebrating five years of the Soft Drinks Industry Levy, better known as the Sugar Tax.Introduced on April 6th 2018, the tax on the production and import of soft drinks that contain added sugar has been a win:win for industry and consumers, and the result of years of campaigning from stakeholders across the sector and support from MPs from the political spectrum.Dr Rupy Aujla, author and host of the Doctor's Kitchen books and podcast, and his latest book, Dr. Rupy Cooks is our guest presenter. He joins Isabel Hughes from The Food Foundation , Peter Harding, Chief Executive Officer for Suntory Beverage & Food Europe, Katherine Jenner of the Obesity Health Alliance and Dr Paul McArdle and Jamie Oliver to explore why it was such a turning point in the campaign for access to a healthy diet for everyone in the UK. For more information on the Sugar Tax, click here. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Barbara Crowther from Sustain, the Alliance for Food and Farming considers how we can create a world where all children can have a healthy school meal without barriers or stigma.Sustain's network of over 100 Food farming, health education, and schools groups is working to create a better food environment for children to grow up in, to learn, to eat healthily and be healthy. Barbara introduces its campaign Say YES to School Food For All which, with a group of children, imagines what school could be like if we treated other parts of the school day like we treat school food.Quick here for The Food Foundation's Quick Bites webinar series Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In the second of the Food Foundation Podcast’s Quick Bites, its series of thoughts and snap analyses on key news events, we’re visiting FF HQ to meet more of the team.Shona Goudie is the Senior Policy and Advocacy officer at the Food Foundation which has been tracking levels of food insecurity in the UK since the start of the pandemic. With today's update on the Food Insecurity Tracker, Shona paints a picture of how it's affecting Britain.Click here for the Food Foundation's series of Quick Bites webinars on YouTube. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In the first of the Food Foundation Podcast’s Quick Bites, its series of thoughts and snap analyses on key news events, we’re talking about the Budget.Zoe McIntyre is the project manager for Children's Right2Food, the Food Foundation’s nationwide initiative to ensure every child in the UK can access and afford good food. She tells us why it matters that 800,000 children living in poverty, who continue to miss out on free school meals have not been given any airtime in today's budget.Click here for more information on the Food Foundation and here for its series of webinars on YouTube. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, guest presenter, food writer, chef, founder of Wahaca restaurants, and trustee of Chefs in Schools, Thomasina Miers asks what opportunities the current fruit and veg shortages could offer to build resilience into our broken food system in the UK. The Food Foundation has recently published a series of briefings in collaboration with a team of researchers from the Sustainable and Healthy Food Systems (SHEFS) consortium. They explore the opportunities of growing and eating more fruit and veg in the UK and its impact on our health, the environment and our food security.We hear from Ali Capper, chair of British Apples and Pears, Guy Singh-Watson of Riverford Organics. Martin Emmett, chair of the National Farmer's Union's Horticultural and Potatoes Board, James Woodward from Sustain and Anna Taylor, the Food Foundation's executive director.For more information on the work The Food Foundation does with SHEFS, click hereFor The Food Foundation's snap analysis Quick Bites series on YouTube, click here Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, Sophie Lawrence, Stewardship and Engagement Lead at Rathbone Greenbank Investments is our guest presenter. She was one of the guests who spoke at The Food Foundation’s Investor Summit, Putting Money on the Menu, which was the first of its kind to explore how the investment community can transform the UK food system.Following the UN Food Systems Summit and the release of the National Food Strategy in 2021, an Investor Coalition on Food Policy was created, initially set up by Rathbone Greenbank, with support from Guy’s and St Thomas’ Foundation and the Food Foundation. The Coalition, which now represents over 20 investors with over £6 trillion in assets under management is focused on the UK to begin with and exists to harness the power of the investment community to engage with policymakers on food policy. Sophie finds out what investors could mean to the future of the food system, with Tim Benton from the Environment and Society Programme at Chatham House, Jessica Attard from ShareAction, Rune-Christoffer Dragsdahl, Secretary-General at the Vegetarian Society of Denmark and Director of Policy Initiatives at the International Vegetarian Union, Morten Fenger of Organic Plant Protein in Denmark and Stuart Lendrum, head of product and process at Iceland. To find out more about the Coalition, click here Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week, Melissa Hemsley, food writer, chef and sustainability champion, joins the Food Foundation podcast to look at the factors that can stop women getting healthy food when they're pregnant and when they're planning to be.The Food Foundation's latest report Preconception, Pregnancy and Healthy Weight in Childhood shows how much a child’s health is influenced before conception, in the womb, and how a child is predisposed to obesity if their parents, especially their mother is living with obesity. We meet mums and food workers from around the country who describe what it's like to try to feed your unborn and newborn child when transport and the cost of living crisis makes access and affordability just two of the biggest deterrents to a healthy diet.Nutritionist and one of the authors of the report, Jenny Rosborough outlines its main findings, while Jeni Meadows of the Food Justice Partnership at Lancaster City Council, Lucy Jackman of Feeding Bristol and Natasha Ricketts from the Evelyn Community Centre in Lewisham introduce us to some of the mums who need the most help.Check out the report here which urges Government to do more to address health inequalities and improve the food environment, particularly for families and parents on a low income. Rates of overweight and obesity in pregnant women increase as the level of deprivation increases. Women living in the most deprived areas are more likely to be underweight or are living with obesity.The report draws attention to the fact that, while Government has acknowledged the need to reduce levels of childhood obesity, more than 1 fifth of children aged four and five start school in England with overweight or obesity (22.2%). These rates are more than twice as high in children living in the most deprived areas compared to the least.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, we’re at the front line of food insecurity as we visit some of the food banks feeding migrants and asylum seekers who don’t have recourse to public funds this Christmas.We’re looking at the key findings of a new report by researchers at the University of Hertfordshire and commissioned by the Food Foundation. It shows a pretty bleak Christmas for over a million migrants and asylum seekers waiting for their legal status to be approved.The Food Foundation wants the Healthy Start food voucher scheme to be made permanent, and to actively promote access to it among families with no recourse to public funds (NRPF)We want the Government to provide local authorities with the resources they need to ensure families with no recourse to public funds to get the support they need. And that includes accommodation with adequate kitchen and cooking facilities for asylum seekers. And we want the govt to collect data to establish real levels of food insecurity among families and individuals with NRPF.Listen to why it matters with Claire Thompson at University of Hertfordshire, Ray Woolford from We Care at Kath's Place, Juliet Sekitoleko at Brighton Minority and Ethnic Community Partnership Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.