3Keel at ECI: Food and cities
On Monday Julian Cottee and Tom Curtis will be at Oxford University’s Environmental Change Institute (ECI) presenting insights from 3Keel’s work on urban food systems.
Organised in collaboration with the Oxford Martin Programme on the Future of Food, the seminar will explore how 3Keel’s FoodPrinting work has allowed cities and regions to model the environmental impacts and dependencies of food consumption, and to build future scenarios for greater sustainability. The second part of the seminar will engage with the challenges and opportunities around putting food sustainability strategies into action at city level, using material from our recent City Region Food Systems project for the Prince of Wales’ International Sustainability Unit, and drawing on Julian’s experience as Chair of Oxford’s sustainable food network, Good Food Oxford.
Our work on urban food systems over the last few years has included the development of models of the lifecycle impacts of food consumption at city level, allowing policies and initiatives to be based on quantitative data. Pioneering a Scope 3 assessment methodology for food system greenhouse gas emissions modelling, the FoodPrinting Oxford report – carried out in partnership with Oxford City Council and Low Carbon Oxford – allowed the city for the first time to put a figure (of 380,000 tonnes annually) on the emissions created by food consumption, more than double the road transport emissions in the same period. The report also provided an ‘alternative FoodPrint’ scenario showing how a set of ambitious but feasible actions could reduce the city’s food-related greenhouse gas emissions by 36%.
More recently, in addition to applying the FoodPrinting methodology in other cities and regions including Greater Manchester, 3Keel has been studying the practical considerations around operationalizing city level food sustainability strategies. As part of the project ‘Food in an Urbanised World’ commissioned by the International Sustainability Unit, we have been looking at the governance conditions in cities worldwide that have led to successful food sustainability strategies. Knowledge alone does not lead to action – there must also be political will and appropriate cross-sector partnerships bringing together a broad range of stakeholders to formulate long-term strategy. Where local government, business and the civic sector come together in creative ways, cities worldwide are providing leadership on tackling some of the big issues around sustainable food.
Our recent work has taken us as far afield as the food systems of Bogota, Lusaka, New York and Belo Horizonte, but we’re also applying lessons from those places in our work in Oxford – 3Keel is delighted to be contributing our insights to help our own city move closer towards a food system that is fair, healthy and sustainable.
Tom and Julian’s talk is part of the Multi-Level Food System Seminar Series at the Oxford University Environmental Change Institute, and will take place from 4.15 on Monday 9th March, to be followed by a wine reception. More details on the Oxford Martin Future of Food website.
For more information on 3Keel’s urban food systems work, contact tom.curtis@3keel.com
Pioneering a Scope 3 assessment methodology for food system greenhouse gas emissions modelling, the FoodPrinting Oxford report allowed the city for the first time to put a figure on the emissions created by food consumption – more than double the road transport emissions in the same period.
