Can the public contribute to more sustainable foodtures and value creation through short chain food procurement? - case-insights from the city of Aalborg

Description

Developing the sense of place as part of food identity is considered an important element in regional food economies. That is, place as part of the foods of and food as part of the place identity. This identity creation is believed to be a result of a range of diverse innovation efforts in the food sector of cities. Farmers markets, street food centres, community agriculture, local fine dining profiling, farm holidays and gastro tourism are examples of market driven initiatives to develop strong city/region based cuisines and food identities. At the same time they contribute to creating liveable cities and regions. But the role of the public has so far only been partly understood. How can cities and regions play a role in establishing the intangible assets of places? Can the public at the same time pursue goals on more sustainable food systems by developing policies for short chain sourcing for the public plate? The Aalborg study examine the role of the public and take a closer look at the role of multiple stakeholders in creating short supply chains for the public plate in the municipality of Aalborg and the surrounding region North. It is based on interviews with both supply and demand side stakeholders currently or potentially involved in public plate procurement. It concludes that intersectoriality and cross organisational cooperation in local and regional government administration, knowledge transfer, education and training of food service workers, management and procurement officials are important requirements on the demand side. On the supply side cross-enterprise cooperation is crucial if minimum critical mass is to be reached and trade and business interest associations can play an important role here. For this to succeed openness to close public private pre-competitive cooperation is important. In particular smoothening up requirements for public tenders is considered important

Period	14 Sept 2017
Event title	Greener Cities
Event type	Conference
Location	Bologna, ItalyShow on map