What is it?
The Community of Practice (CoP) for Food & Health is an international collaborative network initiated by the FEAST project. The CoP leverages our cross-Europe exposure through the networks of FEAST partners and organisations that builds on and scales the results of past and ongoing research projects on the topics of Food & Health.
The CoP community functions as a digital platform that brings together relevant European stakeholders, predominantly Living Labs, for targeted exchange on topics within the CoP scope, as there are: (1) behavioral change, (2) health inequalities, (3) food environments, and (4) health policies. Within this scope, the CoP pursues three main objectives, namely: facilitating knowledge brokerage, generating policy impact and stimulating stakeholder dialogue.
Until now, 19 Living Labs from 11 European countries have boarded the CoP train.
The Community of Practice sessions
In terms of concrete activities within the Community of Practice for Food & Health, FEAST partner SUSMETRO coordinates and facilitates online exchanges between Living Labs, establishing links with the wider network environment consisting of the FOOD2030 Project Collaboration Network, the Sustainable Food System Network (SFSN) and others to jointly support the transitions to healthy and sustainable diets for all.
These type of knowledge brokerage sessions are scheduled on a monthly basis and explores the intersection of food and health based on thematic cases proposed by the CoP community themselves. The proposed cases offer deep dives into a certain issue within the community with the goal of sharing knowledge and to examine possible solutions, methods or strategies for advancing with the ambitions and needs of the Living Lab in question.
It is therefore a platform of inspiration, co-creation and the outcomes of the discussions can be used as actionable items for a range of stakeholders active in the agri-food sector, including the LL staff itself.
Lessons Learned from Previous CoPs
So far, two CoPs have been organized with two interesting cases brought to the table by the Living Labs. One of these cases was presented by the Living Lab “Azienda Usl Toscana Nord Ovest” - a Living Lab and CoP member based in Tuscany, Italy.
The Living Lab in Tuscany came up with the question: How can we analyze the economic and social impact within the focus group among middle and high schools to better understand the type of interventions that will stimulate positive changes in the food behaviour of youngsters, while understanding the social norm behind their food choices? For this case the resulting summary document of the CoP session listed a number of lessons learned.
One of those lessons is “revising the possible pitfalls around the theory of planned behavior when it comes to measuring the social impact on food behaviour.” For instance, food habits and family and power dynamics are not always considered when it comes to studying the corelation between personal intentions and individual food choices.
This case shows the importance of the CoP for the co-creation of possible solutions and action point to help overcome a challenge that a Living Lab is facing to move forward with a specific research project.
Join the FEAST CoP!
Does this spark your interest? The CoP sessions are open to all relevant Living Labs from FEAST and other food- related EU projects.
Are you a Living Lab that explores the intersection between the topics of Food & Health?
Do you want to engage with fellow experts that are active the field?
Do you face a challenge within your living lab that you want to discuss with the CoP community?
If the answer is YES, then join the CoP community/becoming a member of the CoP community and start the FEAST journey of inspiration, co-creation and cross collaboration.
Let’s transform challenges into new opportunities and action points!
Register
here to become our next CoP member and get updates on the upcoming CoP sessions!