Giving Compass' Take:

• The Rockefeller Foundation summarizes the results of a challenge that encouraged communities to come up with a plan for more positive future food systems.

• With many expectations for the future ensconced in negativity, why is it important to encourage positive strategies for future food systems? What can you do to fund ideas for positive future food systems?

• Learn about what COVID-19 is teaching us about the future of food systems.

Looking to inspire more hopeful and ambitious thinking, we created the Food System Vision Prize, challenging communities around the world to describe an ideal vision for their local food system. More than 1,300 teams – comprised of over 4,000 global NGOs, non-profits, research institutions, farmer-based organizations, restaurants, universities, private companies and government agencies – co-created and submitted their visions for what a positive future food system that nourishes all people and regenerates the environment could look like.

Guided by a how-to manual from The Rockefeller Foundation, teams developed visions that addressed six key themes: environment, diets, economics, culture, technology, and policy. Critically, the visions had to employ systems thinking; illustrate their transformative potential; and be inspiring, feasible, community-informed, and community-created.

From Brisbane, Beijing, and Berlin, to Chennai, Cape Town and Chicago, these city-based visions made passionate cases for how urban contexts will help shape future food systems. While some city visions mentioned unique challenges such sea level rise and severe droughts, most concerns were common for almost all cities: extreme weather and a changing climate; air pollution, insufficient public transport, and long commutes; soaring living expenses, rapid urban growth, and encroachment of the few remaining biodiverse areas by urban development; diets high in ultra-processed packaged foods and junk food; and  a resulting tsunami of cases of obesity, diabetes, and cancer. All of these issues, in various ways, intersect with the food system and confront cities with complex and interconnecting challenges.

Learn more about these three city-based visions and explore the rest of the 70+ Semi-Finalists visions. Each vision imagines a more hopeful and inspiring future with food systems that are nourishing, resilient, equitable, and sustainable.

Read the full article about positive future food systems by Sara Farley and Daniel Skaven Ruben at The Rockefeller Foundation.