Can you be a Food Systems Game Changers? If yes, then look for this Global Open Call launched by the Food Systems Game Changers Lab, inviting individuals, teams, institutions, companies, and cooperatives everywhere to bring their ideas, initiatives, or innovations for food systems change forward in partnership with others.
No matter how you’re involved with food—whether you provide, distribute, study, invent, or consume it; advocate for, invest in, make policy around, write about, or design for it—you’re invited to be part of the action. And part of the solution.
The Deadline to apply is 14 May, 2021
Select ideas will be featured in a flagship publication, and matched with potential implementation partners or investors alongside the 2021 United Nations Food Systems Summit (UNFSS). The Global Open Call aims to be the first step in identifying and uniting diverse voices to take action and put forward concrete examples aligned to the UN’s prioritized solutions.
Sara Farley, Managing Director of The Rockefeller Foundation’s Food Initiative said, “Today’s food system doesn’t meet the needs of people or our planet. The status quo is increasing diet-related disease and accelerating the effects of climate change, not to mention predicated on inequity. We need an inclusive approach that transforms the global food system to be nourishing and regenerative while advancing human dignity and supporting cultures to thrive.”
The United Nations Secretary-General is hosting the 2021 Food Systems Summit to spearhead transformation of the world’s food systems to work for people, planet, and prosperity by 2030. The event will push beyond the bounds of food and agriculture to include solutions that take into account environment, health, climate, economy, human rights, and more. To that end, the UNFSS seeks to engage directly with diverse communities around the world to bring their ideas and actions to the table, realizing the ambition of being “a people’s summit.”
For the past several months, hundreds of groups have supported the UN Food Systems Summit process by developing calls for solutions around 5 key themes or Action Tracks. As the Summit approaches, these topics are being prioritized under “Areas for Collective Action” for which innovation, initiative, partnership, and commitments are needed. Through the Food Systems Game Changers Lab, even more people across the world are invited to join in this effort, to make their voices heard and ideas visible.
The Food Systems Game Changers Lab is a multi-phase program conceptualized by EAT, IDEO, Thought for Food, The Rockefeller Foundation, and other collaborators, that aims to include anyone, anywhere in formulating solutions to the calls for action that support the UNFSS organizers.
Phase 1, The Global Open Call, is hosted by the global design firm IDEO, and seeks game changers who have the passion, grit, collaborative-spirit, and determination required to take their solutions—whether ideas, initiatives, or innovations—forward in partnership with others and share them alongside the 2021 UN Food Systems Summit.
Rebecca Chesney, Director at IDEO said, “Transforming the food system cannot be done by organizations and individuals working in silos. This call engages the global community to share all kinds of ideas and initiatives—local to global, traditional to innovative—and collaborate to design for impact.”
Those submitting solutions to The Global Open Call—teams, individuals, organizations, and other groups—compete to become Game Changers who will be invited to continue to the second phase of the Food Systems Game Changers Lab, where they will further refine their solutions ahead of the 2021 UN Food Systems Summit.
Christine Gould, Founder of the Millennial and Gen Z-focused agri-food innovation network Thought For Food and a member of the UN Food Systems Summit Advisory Committee said, “Systems change demands a new approach: new minds working together in brave ways to build the resilient and inclusive world that we need. We are seeking to engage more than the usual suspects in this first-of-its-kind Food Systems Game Changers Lab. No matter how you’re involved with food—whether you provide, transport, study, invent, or consume it; advocate for, invest in, make policy around, write about, or design for it—you’re invited to be part of the action and part of the solution.”
The Food Systems Game Changers Lab brings people into an experiential program, hosted by Thought For Food, that fuses tailored mentorship, facilitation, expert masterclasses, and partnership formation. In Phase 3, their ideas will be featured in a flagship publication released at the time of the Summit and they will be matched with potential implementation partners or investors.
Then these new coalitions will begin the work of turning ideas into reality in Phase 4 post-Summit. Throughout the Food Systems Game Changers Lab, participants will work with diverse teams to develop and launch bold and actionable solutions to transform the way the world produces, processes, distributes, and consumes food.
