The Guidelines for the Design and Implementation of African Union Development Agency (AUDA-NEPAD) Home Grown School Feeding Programmes in Africa is the result of a collaborative effort supported by the African Union Commission for Education, Science, Technology and Innovations (AUC-ESTI) and the World Food Programme (WFP).
Home Grown School Feeding has been recognized by African leaders for its contribution to human resources and capital development in the continent and for having an important role in inclusive development, health, rural development, gender equality and inclusive education, particularly for the poor and socially marginalised communities.
These HGSF guidelines are meant to provide general direction or guidance to African Union Member States who wish to establish HGSF programmes or review existing school feeding programmes to link them more directly with smallholder farmers and other role players in the school food value chain, while addressing the nutrition component more adequately.
The five school feeding quality standards form the organizational structure of these guidelines, namely, i) policy and legal framework, ii) financial capacity and stable funding, iii) institutional capacity for implementation and coordination, iv) design and implementation, v) and community participation.
The mandate ofAUDA-NEPAD is to: a) Coordinate and Execute priority regional and continental projects to promote regional integration towards the accelerated realisation of Agenda 2063; and b) Strengthen capacity of African Union Member States and regional bodies, advance knowledge-based advisory support, undertake the full range of resource mobilisation and serve as the continent’s technical interface with all Africa’s development stakeholders and development partners.
This African Union Development Agency (AUDA-NEPAD) Home Grown School Feeding (HGSF) Handbook was prepared primarily based on the experience and lessons from Botswana, Ghana and Nigeria.
These three countries are among the most advanced countries in implementing HGSF which are supported and led by their national government.
The handbook is one of the tools to share an example of a multi-tiered approach to country level interventions for effective delivery on nutrition and food systems.
The mandate of AUDA-NEPAD is to: a) Coordinate and Execute priority regional and continental projects to promote regional integration towards the accelerated realisation of Agenda 2063; and b) Strengthen capacity of African Union Member States and regional bodies, advance knowledge-based advisory support, undertake the full range of resource mobilisation and serve as the continent’s technical interface with all Africa’s development stakeholders and development partners.
During a convening at the Bellagio Center in July 2023, a group of experts co-created the RAF Roadmap, aligning closely with the SDGs. The experts, with backgrounds in nutrition, environmental conservation, aquaculture, policy development economics and community practices, recognized the need for a universal cross-organizational effort to advance regenerative aquatic foods, emphasizing sustainability and equitable food systems.
It was agreed that RAFs are aquatic foods from systems that enhance ecosystems, rather than deplete, and also offer restorative benefits, fostering positive relationships between people and nature. A four-dimensional (4D) framework of sustainable food systems (Fig. 1) was employed to identify the diverse benefits of RAF across nutrition, planetary, socio-cultural, and economic dimensions.
Figure 1: 4D Framework
This roadmap identifies strategic areas essential for upscaling RAF production sustainably:
Consumption:
integrate RAFs into diets by creating appealing products, gaining endorsements from food champions, including RAFs in dietary guidelines and food composition tables, and supporting efforts in consumer education.
Community-based practices:
enable local and Indigenous communities to steward and benefit from RAF resources, enhanc-ing food sovereignty and sustainable management.
Ecosystem services:
monetize services such as carbon cycling, species recov-ery and nutrient reduction to promote economic systems that value ecological restoration and conservation.
Capital investment:
encourage innova-tive, environmentally friendly production methods through sufficient funding and effective financial mechanisms.
Technology and innovation:
utilize advanced technologies (for example, environmental monitoring and forecast-ing technology, and native species breed-ing programs) to optimize production and participatory incentive structures designed by local communities to ensure sustainability.
The Rockefeller Foundation and the Bellagio Center provided the facilities and funding to host this historic convening. Support (monetary and in-kind) were also provide by GAIN, The Nature Conservancy, Builders Initiative, and Food + Planet.
This text was adpated from: Vogliano, C., Kennedy, G., Thilsted, S., Mbuya, M. N. N., Battista, W., Sadoff, C., White, G., Kim, J. K., Pucher, J., Koome, K., D’Cruz, G., Geagan, K., Chang, K., Sumaila, U. R., Palmer, S., & Alleway, H. (2024). Regenerative aquatic foods can be a win–win for human and planetary health. Nature Food, 5, 718–719. https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-024-01043-5.
A senior UCD academic from the SPHPSS has contributed to Airfield’s Education and Research Committee since 2020.
The collaboration has enabled student training and research relevant to sustainable food systems through BSc human nutrition undergraduate work placements, and MSc dietetics and PhD nutritional science projects for over seven years. It has allowed Airfield Estate to establish itself as a research body on both national and international stages.
UCD gains access to the public and use of the farm, gardens, restaurant, and demonstration kitchen for practice-based training of students and research studies.
Airfield Estate gains access to academic processes and research project supervision.
This UCD-Airfield Estate collaboration provides a mutually beneficial, relatively low-cost structure to create research, train students and access the public.
Background:
Airfield Estate is a 38-acre working farm and gardens located in the suburbs of Dublin, Ireland. Open every day to the public, its aim is to become Dublin’s Sustainable Food Hub in a world-leading, sustainable food city. Run as an organic and regenerative farm, the Estate completes the farm-to-fork story with a restaurant and farmers market supplied by the farm and gardens. As an organisation that has 230,000 visitors a year, and which has both an educational and research remit, it offers an opportunity for its local University, UCD, to collaborate on a range of projects. UCD, a public research university with over 38,000 students, is Ireland’s largest university.
Collaborations between Airfield Estate and UCD range from undergraduate professional work experience (9 months) to postgraduate masters and PhD projects. The Estate also facilitates UCD conferences and summer school visits that focus on the practical application of sustainable food systems as well as consumer behaviour change.
UCD students and supervisors work in partnership with the education and research department of Airfield Estate to create research projects from hypothesis to dissemination. Critical to this is the facilitation of ethical approval for these projects through the University. The participation of a high level UCD academic on the Education and Research Committee at Airfield Estate is also important as it supports Airfield Estate positioning itself for academic grant applications and ensuring that the Estate engages in relevant research.
The success of the collaborative approach between UCD and Airfield Estate is based on offering academic staff and students a whole system understanding and approach to food systems as well as access to and working with both food production experts and consumers. The research conducted by students on the Estate is consumer-centered and intervention-driven creating a testbed for programmes with potential to be scaled to national and international levels. Airfield Estate has email and social media access to a large public cohort offering an invaluable reservoir for conducting surveys, creating focus groups and accessing audiences for research dissemination events. UCD provides academic supervision of all placements and projects ensuring that they are ethically and rigorously conducted.
Lessons Learnt
1) The symbiosis of academic and non-academic education and research partners creates novel opportunities for education and research.
Having a non-academic partner with a focus on educating the public, advocating for sustainable food systems and a large database of customers, members, and followers on social media offers the academic partner a unique opportunity for education and research into consumer behaviour and consumers’ relationships with food. The facilities and proximity to the academic partner (3 km) allow for easy access for student placements and supervision, summer school educational visits, conference outings, and lectures. The provision of restaurant meals with food supplied by the farm and gardens demonstrates the practical application of a food systems approach.
UCD has been critical to the establishment of Airfield’s education and research department, contributing ethical review and approval for all research projects undertaken, the students to undertake the projects, and academic supervision. This ensures an ethical and rigorous process that protects vulnerable population groups is in place as well as facilitating the submission of high-quality research findings to national and international conferences and for peer-reviewed publication. The students and researchers from UCD working with Airfield Estate also provide an opportunity for the Estate to measure the impact of internally driven projects and programmes which is critical to future grant funding applications.
2) The non-academic partner must have a structure capable of planning and managing research.
Airfield Estate’s strategy contains several pillars, one of which is ‘Powerful Research’. As such, it has developed an Education and Research Committee with both external and internal stakeholders that meets quarterly and has created its own 5-year research strategy. The Board, Trustees and Senior management of the Estate are all supportive of the research conducted at the Estate and a model of both internal research (supported by 9-month work placements by BSc human nutrition students and an in-house research officer) and international research (European Union Horizon projects) has developed.
3) Selection of topics for research must be relevant and robust for both parties.
So as not to waste time and limited resources, as a self-funded non-academic body, Airfield Estate needs to plan and strategically and critically evaluate research that is relevant to its remit and to its potential to submit successful future grant applications. Hence, the decision-making process on what research projects are undertaken must be robust and meet the needs of both the non-academic and academic partners. The research data and end user of the intervention must also be clearly identified in advance, utilize the expertise of academic staff and must fulfil students’ academic programme requirements.
Food for Thought • How can a non-academic partner contact a university (and vice versa) to begin a conversation on collaborating? Is there a structure within your organization or university for this? • Memorandums of understanding are important to define the aims, relationships, and resources needed for the partnership. • Piloting small interventions through local non-academic partners brings research to life for the public, enriches the offering and grant potential of the organization, and provides a high-quality and engaging learning experience for students.
Contact Information:
Prof Clare Corish, Professor of Clinical Nutrition and Dietetics, University College Dublin, clare.corish@ucd.ie
This project developed a handbook with 60 hours of ready-to-use coursework on implementing the Planetary Health Diet and educational formats on transformative action and sustainability in training dietitians in Germany.
This project was funded by The German Federal Environmental Foundation (Deutsche Bundesstiftung Umwelt, DBU) and run by KLUG e.V. (German Association on Climate Change and Health), VDD e.V. (German Association of Dietitians), and the School of Dietitians at the University Hospital Münster.
Lessons Learnt: Topics of sustainable and healthy diets and transformative education can be implemented as a singular course or integrated throughout the training of dietitians.
Background:
Nutrition, health, and the environment are closely linked and mutually dependent. In Germany, common dietary patterns and the associated food production pose a significant risk to the health of the population and the climate and health of our planet. The Planetary Health Diet developed by EAT-Lancet provides crucial starting points for a healthy diet within planetary boundaries.
However, the scientifically based, holistic concept is still insufficiently applied in the nutrition and health sectors and is missing in dietetic education curricula. The potential of such a diet, not only in the fight against planetary crises but also for improving population health, is still little known and is not used strategically.
Figure 3: Implementation of the PHD in the teaching kitchen; own picture
The project aimed to develop educational formats on the Planetary Health Diet and transformative action for training professionals in the nutrition and healthcare sector. The model and implementation were tested in a dietetics class.
After a successful trial of the model week on “Planetary Health and the Nutrition of the Future” with students from the School for Dietitians at the University Hospital Münster, the content was evaluated, revised, prepared and passed on to teachers at other dietitian schools in a train-the-trainer seminar with the purpose of scaling.
All materials are available to all schools via the VDD member area or the project lead of KLUG e.V.. Based on these elaborated materials and the evaluation, the design and implementation of a multi-part training course for already working dietitians and nutritionists (across associations) follows. In addition, an adaptation of the materials to the training of physiotherapists and occupational therapists is in preparation.
Food for Thought Besides an increase in knowledge, students experienced an increase in drive, confidence, and assumption of responsibility towards fighting the climate crisis.
The 2024 Austrian Dietary guidelines were developed by the Competence Center for Climate and Health of Austria GmbH (GÖG) together with the Austrian Agency for Health and Food Safety (AGES) and the Austrian Society for Nutrition (ÖGE). Both health and climate aspects were taken into account.
Visit the link to also download the brochure “Healthy eating, good for the climate” (in German) or it can be accessed or ordered via the brochure service of the Ministry of Social Affairs. The brochure contains healthy and climate-friendly recipes based on the plate model. It was developed by three universities of applied sciences for dietology on behalf of the Ministry of Health.
Muñoz-Martínez, J., Cussó-Parcerisas, I., Carrillo-Álvarez, E. Exploring the barriers and facilitators for following a sustainable diet: A holistic and contextual scoping review. Sustainable Production and Consumption (2024). 46, 476-490. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.spc.2024.03.002 (pay wall)
Relevant to:
Dietitians, nutritionists, and public health professionals aiming to promote a shift towards sustainable and healthy diets.
Question:
Identifying the barriers and facilitators people experience when following a sustainable and healthy diet.
Bottom line for nutrition practice:
This research recognises the intricate net of factors that influence individuals to adopt a sustainable and healthy diet. Such influences vary significantly in magnitude and direction among different individuals. The complexity surrounding food decisions demands that interventions and actions targeting food behaviour are tailored to the characteristics and needs of the target population.
Abstract:
Changing current dietary patterns to more sustainable ones is paramount to decrease the pressure food systems are putting onto the planet and people’s health and wellbeing. However, modifying consumers’ behaviour is extremely challenging since multiple factors of variable nature (i.e., personal, socioeconomic, cultural, external…) influence food choices.
For this reason, we aim to identify consumers’ barriers and facilitators for following a sustainable and healthy diet, and explore how these are perceived among people from different socioeconomic backgrounds.
To do so, we conducted a scoping review of the literature with a consultation phase with citizens from Barcelona with different socioeconomic backgrounds.
Results revealed one hundred intricate factors that influence people’s food behaviour, which were grouped into internal, and external factors. Although the literature generally agreed on the direction of influence from the identified factors, the consultation phase generated substantial disagreements given the participants’ diverse perspectives and motivations. However, some limiting factors were commonly mentioned across groups which corresponded to feelings of distrust towards the food industry, lack of time, disgust towards specific foods, and the high cost of foods. Differences across socioeconomic groups were not observed except for the latter. All participants agreed that cost acted as a barrier, although participants from higher socioeconomic backgrounds were more capable to find arguments to overcome the price barrier.
Results are necessary to acknowledge the particularities embedded in each person and the need to design context-based interventions to effectively overcome people’s barriers and enhance their facilitators.
Details of results:
The scoping review revealed 100 intricate factors influencing consumers in following a sustainable and healthy diet.
The consultation phase allowed to identify the nuances surrounding the findings from the literature review.
Significant differences across socioeconomic groups were not observed except for how cost was considered as a barrier. For individuals from low socioeconomic backgrounds, the high cost of food is a decisive factor for not purchasing sustainable food, whereas for those from high socioeconomic backgrounds, the cost barrier can be dissipated by factors linked with knowledge and consciousness.
Additional commonly identified decisive limiting factors were the distrust towards the food industry, lack of time, and disgust towards specific foods.
Newly recognised determining factors included knowledge of ethical aspects of food production, trust in small producers and food sellers, emotional involvement with producers, food addiction, lack of interest, selfishness, the belief that legumes put on weight, being a time-oriented individual, access to culture, food safety, social media, and perceived lack of time.
Of additional interest:
The results from the literature review barely covered the socioeconomic and cultural dimensions of sustainable diets. Although efforts were made to address this limitation by purposely covering this dimension during the consultation phase, future research should take these aspects into account to address sustainable diets in their broadest understanding.
Published by Orgain, written by Mary Purdy, MS, RDN. This 12-page article is inclusive of a useful list of resources and references with 9 suggestions for putting recommendations into practice.
In addition to the topics they raise, two other issues are key for Sustainable Food Systems:
🥤 🛒 PLASTICS are a huge part of the problem in all parts of the food system from production to processing to consumption. We can avoid plastic and help our clients and networks to do the same.
🌳 🦗 There are thousands of INDIGENOUS SPECIES around the world – diverse flora, fungi, and fauna – which can help to heal our planet & people.
To help food service companies support diners in choosing more plant-rich meals, this playbook from WRI’s Better Buying Lab outlines the top 23 ‘behavior change’ strategies drawing on cutting-edge academic research into how people choose food, as well as insights from experts in the food service industry about what works and what doesn’t.
Producing beef emits 20 times more greenhouse gases than common plant-based proteins, which is why shifting diets toward containing less beef, and more plants, is an important climate action.
The playbook is designed to be used by anyone working in the food service sector wishing to make changes within their operations to encourage diners to choose more sustainable, plant-rich options — including chefs, food servers, managers, sales people, marketing and communications professionals, food operators, distributors, researchers, nutritionists, dietitians, and procurement teams.
The Vegetarian Nutrition Dietetic Practice Group (VN DPG) is the leading authority on evidence-based plant-based nutrition for the public and health professionals who wish to learn more about the benefits of plant-based diets for health and sustainability.
VN DPG professionals are at the forefront of educating the public about vegetarian nutrition and its relationship to disease management and prevention. The VN DPG comprises about 1,400 members. The membership comprises a significant number of Americans, Canadians and overseas members from Europe, Australia, Africa, Asia and the Middle East. VN DPG members work as consultants, clinical dietitians, researchers and in other job settings.
Position of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics: Vegetarian Diets: “Plant-based diets are more environmentally sustainable than diets rich in animal products because they use fewer natural resources and are associated with much less environmental damage.”
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