Croydon's Food Forum - a case study

The aims, background and operation of the Croydon Food Forum

Project Summary

The Food Forum brings together volunteers and professionals involved in local food projects to share good practice and make mutually supportive links. Meeting approximately every six months, the Forum is supported by occasional short newsletters which highlight developments, funding opportunities and so forth.

Lead Organisation: Environment & Sustainability (LA21) Team

Other partners: Various food projects; people interested in food projects

Where: Various - hosted by different community food projects

Timescale: Initiated April 2002, ongoing

Keywords: Food; health; network; forum

Aims

• To improve food access in Croydon, reducing health inequalities and improving community life.
   
• To help local food projects to be successful. To generate 'food links' e.g. food co-ops can increase their purchasing power by buying together.
   
• To offer a supportive networking opportunity to those who are involved in local food projects - allowing groups to compare notes and share good practice.
   
• To offer a 'one stop shop' to food project members attending the event, allowing them to meet in one go several professionals who can support them.
   
• To increase knowledge of opportunities (e.g. funding) amongst food project workers and volunteers in a fun and enjoyable way.
   
• To raise the profile of food access and local food issues in Croydon Environmental benefits of a reduction in 'food miles' through encouraging local food alternatives.

Description

The food forum is a fun two hour meeting, over lunch or refreshments, of around 20 food project workers and volunteers invited from a range of projects, backgrounds and ethnicity e.g. breakfast clubs, lunch clubs, projects affiliated to faith groups, food co-ops, allotment projects, other food-growing projects plus professionals interested in supporting food projects. An attempt is also made (through local press etc.) to target people who might be interested in setting up a new food project. Projects are invited from the Borough of Croydon and other south London Boroughs.

Meetings so far have been hosted by different community food projects, and have taken a topic to focus on with an external speaker invited. However the bulk of the time has been given over to informal networking. There are also occasional newsletters sent to those who have attended or expressed interest in the event, primarily to publicise the next event, and to update participants on the latest developments in food access and funding opportunities, and to disseminate information sent out by London Foodlink.

Outcomes (overall benefits and results)

Although it is difficult to evaluate the outcomes of an informal event like this, a show of hands at each event showed an overwhelming majority had found the forum very useful and effective, and a similar majority wished to see it continue.

When questioned, most participants found the 'networking' element the most useful. Some had met similar projects for the first time, and found it very helpful to be able to compare what they were doing and learn from each other. Several commented that this kind of networking was something they always felt they needed more of, but never found the time to do. Improved knowledge and awareness of food issues amongst participants. Raised local profile of food issues through local press coverage both before and after the events. Professionals stated that they had met groups with whom they were not previously in contact. Although not an original aim of the project, helpful to have a group who can represent the interests of local food projects in Croydon - e.g. the Forum was consulted on the local food projects section of the Croydon Food Strategy (launch March 2003).

Resources - Human

• The Environment & Sustainability Team in Croydon Council organise the events and produce occasional newsletters. This was approx 3.5 officer days for the first event and approx 1.5 officer day for subsequent events (1 day preparation / publicity, half day for the event itself including setting up and clearing away).
   
• Various professionals came along to each event (2 hours plus travel).
   
• Various food project members came along to each event (2 hours plus travel).
   
• Speakers/experts also came along to each event (2 hours plus travel).

Financial and material

• Approx £60 each time paid to Community Cafes by Environment & Sustainability Team for refreshments.
   
• Postage/stationary for occasional mail outs to approx 50 potential participants.
   
• Community Cafes have provided the venue, and produced fantastic refreshments for a bargain price!

Lessons learnt and evaluation

• The hardest thing has been to attract members of the various food projects to come along, as all are busy with the day-to-day work of keeping their project afloat. There is a real danger of ending up with many professionals and only a few food project members - even when people have planned to come along, often a last minute emergency has meant workers and volunteers have been unable to attend.
• 
  This has been tackled by providing a delicious food incentive for those who attend, by varying the time at which the group meet, and by trying to focus on topics of real interest and benefit to food projects (topics decided by participants at each meeting e.g. healthy eating, funding for food projects). It is important to provide the best possible 'value for time' for groups attending as their time is such a precious resource.

Next steps

To keep going with the meetings as long as there is still demand and participants find it useful.

Participants to continue to decide at each forum whether the next one should take place, and if so what would be a useful topic to focus on, therefore the format can keep evolving and remain relevant - and also meetings would cease if they were no longer useful.

The Environment & Sustainability Team have been trying to contact local food producers in Kent, Surrey and Sussex. The aim is to build local food links between suppliers and food projects, reducing food miles and allowing projects to access reasonably priced fresher produce, whilst benefiting struggling local producers. So far it has been hard to encourage producers to come along.

Reliability

This event could be used for other types of common-interest groups who would benefit by making links. It took quite a bit of effort to set up the first meeting, generating publicity and compiling a database to write to those who might be interested. However subsequent events were quite straightforward and fast to organise, using the materials prepared for the first.

It would be most useful for groups who can really benefit from collaboration for example by grouping their purchasing power, publicity or aims; or for groups who have limited opportunities to meet other groups (or professionals who may be able to support them) due to time or other constraints.

Monday, 12 May, 2008

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