Food Policy Resources

In the report, IPES-Food--an independent panel of food systems experts--assesses the negative health impacts of food systems and explains how these systems are locked into cycles that produce poor health. The members of IPES-Food brought their collective wisdom and diverse perspectives to this challenge, outlining the unacceptable harm caused by our current food systems, and calling for precaution, prevention, and collective action. The Global Alliance for the Future of Food worked closely with IPES-Food to: understand the broad range of evidence that informs the report's findings; analyze how and why food systems are making people sick; expose the health costs externalized by the food system; understand how to internalize these costs through healthier food systems practices and explore potential levers for change.

Created by Cecilia Rocha

A food hub, a community development financial institution and an economic development center - three different roles, all working on increasing equity through food systems. This webinar will explore how organizations and businesses in these roles have been proactive and thoughtful in how they incorporate equity and inclusion considerations into their efforts, including where those have been successful, and where there is opportunity to improve. This webinar is inspired by an unprecedented collaboration. The Federal Reserve System and USDA partnered to develop a book focused on the community and economic development opportunities of regional food system investments. The full report explores many positive community impacts of investing in regional food systems.

Presenters: John Flory, Jaime Villalaz, Benjamin Bartley, and Olivia Rebanal

How can we apply equity and anti-racism principles to our food system work? In answer to this question, this webinar provides three examples from the Cooperative Extension System of efforts to promote equity and undo racism in local food systems. Kaitlin Wojciak, from Michigan State University Extension, describes a recent training and learning group dedicated to exploring issues of power, privilege, and racial equity for the state's Community Food Systems team. Shorlette Ammons, from North Carolina's Center for Environmental Farming Systems, discusses the Center's efforts to embed an equity lens and practice into all areas of its work. Heather Manzo, from Penn State Extension, describes work with an urban food policy council to engage diverse community members and positively impact equity issues in the metropolitan food system. Listen to the discussion to learn how these equity initiatives have evolved, the challenges they have faced, and the supportive factors that contributed to the success of their efforts. This webinar was hosted by the working group on Undoing Inequality in the Food System and the Sustainable Agriculture Education Association.

Presenters: Kaitlin Wojciak, Shorlette Ammons, Heather Manzo 

Aligned with the Maryland Food Charter, this report delivers an assessment of Maryland's current policies and provides examples and suggestions of related policies throughout the United States that Maryland could emulate.

Created by Emma Clippinger, Ariel Ardura, Kaitlin Beach, Sydney Montgomery, and Katherine Sandson

This toolkit provides assistance for those seeking to ensure that all kids and families have access to healthy foods in their neighborhoods. It includes resources on healthy food financing programs to overcome barriers to having food stores in underserved areas. The toolkit provides resources for advocates to build a campaign; recruit other advocates; and engage, communicate to, and mobilize diverse audiences. It includes resources on lobbying; media training; example flyers; posters and other advertisements; meeting with legislators; and success stories. 

The intention of this policy scan, presented in a series of six themed papers, maps and summary tables is to inform and contribute to a conversation on building a national food policy in Canada that addresses the inter-related issues of hunger, health, and sustainability.  Current policies at the municipal, provincial/territorial and federal level are explored under each theme. From these policy scans and discussions it is clear that the existing agri-food policy landscape in Canada is highly complex, uneven and dynamic.

Cities across the United States have started to adopt urban agriculture zoning ordinances which provide access to land and encourage food production in low-income black and brown communities. However, many cities fail to use an anti-racist lens in the creation and implementation of these policies. According to scholars and activists, anti-racist practices in urban agriculture zoning require that first, community organizations and policy makers co-create policy with black and brown communities and second, develop secure land tenure arrangements for urban agriculture. The graduate student capstone provides a case study of the development of an urban agriculture zoning ordinance by the Bridgeport Connecticut Food Policy Council.

Created by Chelsea Gazillo

A guide to orienting new members of the policy working groups (i.e. subcommittees) of the Denver (Colorado) Sustainable Food Policy Council. One of the primary purposes of the Denver Sustainable Food Policy Council is to “Provide Recommendations to the City on Regulations and Policies” by providing Mayor and city staff detailed policy analysis and recommendations. To accomplish this purpose, the council established policy working groups made up of city staff, council members, and interested community stakeholders.

On June 19, 2017, Baltimore (Maryland) City Council passed unanimously City Council Resolution 17-0029R: Request for City Action - Supporting the Paris Accord. The resolution requests that the City recognize the importance of the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement; oppose the ill-advised decision to withdraw the United States from the Paris Climate Agreement; and commit to practices that disrupt short-sighted trends in consumption of natural resources and degradation of human health to create a liveable, economical, equitable, and just energy future for all Baltimoreans regardless of age, race, income, or zip code.

This resource is intended to facilitate a shared understanding of the early care and education sector and the natural opportunities to integrate farm to school initiatives into early care and education settings. This shared understanding can support enhanced connectivity between the local food and early care and education communities in order to advance farm to early care and education across the country. This resource includes a basic overview of the early care and education sector, information for getting started with farm to early care and education, and a list of state early care and education agencies and contacts.

Across the country, food banks are looking at their mission through a number of new lenses: health, education and technical assistance, farming, economic and workforce development, business enterprise, and community empowerment and advocacy. Feeding the Line, Or Ending the Line? Innovations among Food Banks in the United States, a new report by Reinvestment Fund and Bank of America looks at how food banks are adopting a variety of approaches within each of these categories to feed the hungry and permanently end food insecurity. These findings emerge from interviews conducted with 16 food banks and hunger-relief organizations.

Created by Patricia Smith, Tess Hart

The objective of this report is to provide insights into the factors that enable the development and delivery of urban food policies and how these enablers can be harnessed and barriers overcome. By exploring a series of case studies, the report shares lessons that cities of all sizes and at all stages of food policy development — from small towns that are taking their first steps in designing food-related policy, to big cities that are striving to maintain highly-developed, integrated policies — can learn from as they work to improve their food system.

Created by Corinna Hawkes and Jess Halliday

This report examines the differences in characteristics between producers who sell direct-to-institution and those who do not. It delves deeper into the practices of producers that sell direct-to-institution and explores sales to institutions through intermediaries like food distributors, food hubs, and food service management companies. This report presents in-depth findings and makes specific, data-driven recommendations for farmers, producer service providers, government officials, funders, and institutions. 

This Prospectus presents a road map for how Washington might achieve its food vision and provides a framework for collaboration, engagement and shared responsibility. The Prospectus provides the opportunity for alignment across sectors, distributed leadership, and continued development of strategies over time. From 2012 to 2017, the Washington State Food System Roundtable, a diverse coalition of public and private partners, developed this Prospectus through a process that included research by consultants, university faculty and graduate students, and input from a variety of interests through a statewide engagement process.

This toolkit was developed to help food councils host a successful events so that decision makers see your food council as a local expert on issues related to food, health and agriculture.  The toolkit includes tips and steps for organizing candidate forums and common best practices for these types of events.

Community health advocates and planners can use this resource to explore how local community planning efforts to support the health and well-being of Kansans by incorporating public health goals into traditional planning elements. The guide includes specific examples from existing local community plans in Kansas to illustrate how language around health can be incorporated into the plans. This resource is merely a starting point to provide guidance on how community health advocates working across Kansas can better leverage local community planning to advance efforts to build a healthier Kansas.

Transformation of the food system rests, in part, on changing the rules by which all actors play. Many of these rules take the form of public policy, whether they be laws, regulations, government spending or other tools used to impact markets. So concerns are raised when local groups in the food movement are reluctant to politically engage to change these rules. This chapter begins by outlining the concepts of food democracy, civic agriculture and civic food networks and their relevance to the advocacy coalition framework (ACF). Then the ACF is used to organize a case study of the Franklin County Local Food Council and its transition from a civically-oriented group to an advocacy coalition through the use of a technical tool: the food policy audit. The chapter concludes by suggesting that community-based food groups have a responsibility to span the civic-political divide and bring food system governance back into balance.

The Food Counts: A Pan-Canadian Sustainable Food Systems Report Card brings together already existing measures of social, environmental, and economic well-being to help researchers, policy makers, and practitioners examine food systems at the national level. The report card uses a food sovereignty framework to reframe food within an integrated systems perspective and makes connections to a global movement focused on food as a means for collective social change. As one practical tool for reimagining Canadian food systems, the Food Counts Report Card acts as a benchmark, identifies gaps in data and where case studies can elaborate on successes and limitations, and informs policy making at all levels of government.

Created by Charles Levkoe, Rachel Lefebvre and Alison Blay-Palmer

A handbook for new members to orient them to the Denver Sustainable Food Policy Council. The handbook covers everything from the Council's mission and values statements to it's membership structure to the group's meeting norms.

The Food Turn Up Report is an educational and visual tool that shares practical ways to prevent and reduce chronic disease by creating a stronger and more local food system. Created by the former River Region Food Policy Council, now Montgomery Roots, this report was crafted intentionally for the Black people in Lowndes, Macon and Montgomery Counties of Alabama after two years of a community food assessment process completed in rural and urban settings in the Black Belt.