‘EU-India region’ hybrid workshop on Sustainable Food Systems

Climate change, loss of biodiversity and the degradation of our lands and oceans are existential threats, which are fast resulting in soil depletion, extreme weather events and nutrition issues. In response to these threats, a hybrid regional workshop ‘Dialogues on Sustainable Food Systems: from production to consumption’ was organised by the European Union (EU) on 27-28 March in New Delhi.

The EU-funded workshop brought together key experts, policymakers as well as public stakeholders from the European Union, India and its neighbouring countries to discuss “Sustainable and Resilient Food Systems”.

This dialogue session sought to exchange views in order to find common grounds, principles and actions, while identifying a way forward to further reinforce and amplify regional cooperation. In particular, discussions/exchanges focussed on how the EU and the Indian sub-continent (India, Bhutan, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bangladesh) can join forces to move towards sustainable and resilient food systems.

Soil health and organic production; sustainable use of pesticides and antimicrobials and food loss and waste, were deliberated on during this fifth workshop financed by the EU project “Farm to Fork – F2F”.

All three topics allowed the multiple stakeholders of the food systems to identify strategies, policies and practices that could lead to different levels of desirable change. Presentations from speakers from India, Nepal, Bhutan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh were followed by a panel discussion on existing or foreseeable synergies between approaches that could pave the way for collaboration, including how this collaboration could support the transition at global level. As part of the its Green Deal, EU has proposed ambitious actions and commitments to transform its food systems (the Farm to Fork Strategy) into global standards for competitive sustainability, the protection of human and planetary health, as well as the livelihoods of all actors in the food value chain. 

The adjustment of food systems, which were also documented and called upon in the UN Food Systems Summit in September 2021, needs to take into account the various contextual differences across the planet regarding cross cutting issues such as land degradation or food loss that ultimately affect how food is produced, processed, transported and consumed.

The question of sustainable food systems goes beyond the means of production and is also subjected to several nutrition challenges such as undernutrition and hunger. These challenges persist while new and multiple forms of malnutrition rise. In particular, food-borne non-communicable diseases such as cancer, obesity, and cardiovascular conditions put pressure on people and health systems.

Although global awareness grows, commitments are made and some solutions are designed and implemented, there is still a need for rapid and firmer action to foster a worldwide cooperation and coordination.

This series of regional and country-focused workshops is funded by the European Commission’s Service for Foreign Policy Instruments (FPI) under the project supporting the Farm to Fork Strategy (F2F), which is the EU plan to contribute to resolving food challenges, and, to this end, proposes pathways for change towards sustainability that provides environmental, health, social and economic benefits.