realising food secure communities
How might we realise food secure communities in Aotearoa?
Local visions and aspirations
Addressing systemic barriers
Conditions to create food secure communities
He kai kei aku ringaringa.
There is food at the ends of my hands.
In Aotearoa, food prices are soaring, contributing to a cost-of-living crisis, while some of our most productive food producing regions are struggling to provide their staples following the natural disasters we experienced earlier this year. This is just the latest in what has now been years of crisis response – which some are now calling a poly-crisis. Continuing to focus on fighting the fires is only going to get us so far.
Transformational change will only come when we have a shared understanding of the new reality we want to move towards, and we understand what tools and levers will help us to make this shift.
This whakatauki speaks to our ability to realise food secure communities. He kai kei aku ringa: there is food at the ends of my hands. We have the tools and knowledge we need to make it happen; we use our skills for success; all our hands are important to work together.
So how might we realise food secure communities in Aotearoa?
Food secure communities
Local visions and aspirations
Kore Hiakai Zero Hunger Collective has embarked on a project that explores this question. We explored 39 reports, plans and strategies, from 30 localities, who have dug deep to understand local food security, kai sovereignty, food resilience, and sustainable local food systems, in order to decide what will help their communities to be food secure.
Kore Hiakai has drawn this wisdom together in a paper to be released on the 23rd May 2023. The insights in these communities contribute to building our shared understanding of how to realise food secure communities, and the barriers and enablers to making that our shared reality. Below is a taste of what we have found.
Common themes
Many localities drew from Māori understandings of kai. They saw the revitalization of Māori kai sovereignty as an essential part of the vision for local food systems, which are fundamentally different in worldview from more linear, industrial food systems. They aspire to food systems that are:
Local
Affordable
Connected
Healthy
Regenerative
Resilient
What does a food secure community look like in practice?
In food secure communities, we have more time and are living less stressful, more sustainable lives. We can buy good, affordable, local food, we can garden, cook, fish or gather food. We share and connect over food. We learn and pass on food skills and knowledge about our food traditions and values, including mātauranga Māori.
We have a diversity of local food businesses that provide healthy, affordable and sustainable food to local communities. There are social food hubs, farmers markets, food coops, cafés and restaurants and other local food stores. We celebrate local food traditions and delicacies. Our food businesses have fair returns and pay fair wages to their employees. Local food processing facilities and distribution chains support local businesses to grow.
In food secure communities, we recognise nature as the source of our food and vital to our health and wellbeing. We protect productive lands, biodiversity and our environment, including through use of regenerative practices growing nutrient dense, organic food, and a circular economy that prevents, reuses or redistributes surplus and waste. In doing so, our food systems become more resilient to crises. Mana whenua can uphold their whakapapa responsibilities as kaitiaki, and mahinga kai are flourishing.
Fundamental changes to our food systems
Addressing systemic barriers
Localities are clear that realising food secure communities will require fundamental changes to our food system, addressing systemic barriers.
Localities are struggling with the impacts of a profit-driven economy and industrial food systems that do not prioritise the value of people and whānau, local economies and the environment. Power in the food system sits with corporate food industries. This is enabled by central government at the expense of local people and local food economies. This happens through over-regulation of ‘good’ food from small businesses, and under regulation of ‘bad’ food (unhealthy, highly processed, poor environmental practices) from the corporate food industry. Industrial food systems are degrading our environment and are a major contributor to climate emissions.
This is compounded by high rents, low and insecure incomes, and the high cost of food. It means that providing enough good food is difficult and stressful for time-poor families working long hours on moderate wages. A proliferation of cheap and convenient fast food in low-income communities, with a lack of good healthy food options makes good food choices difficult. It leads to a sense of disconnection from food and poor health.
Look out for our May Pānui for the full report, and to register for a webinar coming in June!
imagination and creation
Conditions to create localised food security
Despite this, localities saw opportunities to create the conditions that would enable their communities to be food secure. These opportunities include:
National and local government food strategies and policies that create pathways to sustainable local food systems.
Local food networks to support collaboration and positive change in local food systems.
Cultivating care for the environment, including enabling mana whenua to actively fulfill responsibilities as kaitiaki.
Recognising ‘he kai he rongoā, he rongoā he kai’ – food is our medicine and medicine is our food. Thus, protecting the source of our kai, and noting the vital contribution it has to our health and wellbeing.
Upholding mātauranga Māori, supporting the restoration and revival of ancestral places and practices.
Employers contribute to food security for their employees by paying fair wages and promoting flexible working.
Policies and regulation that support healthy food environments and limit fast food outlets, especially in low-income areas and for children.
Policies and regulations that support local food economies and that shift power away from the corporate food industry.
Support to grow local food economies, such as farmers markets.
Social food hubs that help communities grow, share, buy and enjoy good food.
Other ways for communities to grow, share, learn about and enjoy local fruit and veggies such as community gardens, edible fruit trees in communities, urban farms and supporting backyard gardening.
Looking across the range of amazing mahi, we saw local governments that have developed strategies to create sustainable local food systems in genuine partnership with mana whenua. Local governments have shown how a local food resilience strategy and food systems thinking, over a number of years, can contribute to systemic change across a city.
Communities have also shown that the leadership to create local food systems also lies in the hands of communities, through both the creation and delivery of plans and strategies, and a multitude of actions to support food secure communities in healthy environments.
He kai kei tātou ringaringa.
There is food at the end of our hands.
Look out for our May Pānui for the full report, and to register for a webinar coming in June!