In recent years there has been an increase across Europe in local government policies and initiatives around food (systems) and nutrition. This has been accompanied and driven by the emergence of participatory spaces, including food policy councils, that engage communities in food policy making at the local level.

The project examines concrete policies and initiatives by local and regional governments and spaces of community participation in six European countries: Austria, Belgium, Germany, Portugal, Spain and Sweden. The project examined areas of engagement and constraints faced by local governments, as well as the transformative character (from a human rights perspective) of the policies and initiatives put forward.

Moreover, a central emphasis of the project was to understand how participation is organised across the different countries and localities: which structures are in place and what influence do they hold, who participates and who remains at the margins, how are power relations and conflicts of interest addressed?

Project outcomes are presented in three outcomes: (1) a mapping that summarizes the situation for each of the six countries and draws some general reflections, (2) an interactive map that provides more detail on the cases reviewed and (3) a toolkit that seeks to create greater understanding of how to operationalise human rights based local policy making, including impacts at the level of the EU.

Findings from the mapping point to important steps being taken at the local level to re-localize food systems and make them more healthy, sustainable, and just. There is an increased recognition by local governments of the role they can play and multiple strategies and initiatives covering critical areas of intervention from communal catering and public procurement, to support for ecological production and local markets, to changes in land use criteria. At the same time, local government is constrained by a number of internal and external factors including a lack of human and financial resources, and EU policies which hinder regionalisation.  

The project’s findings also reflect the immense diversity that exists across Europe – and within countries – with regard to structures of community participation. They highlight the critical relevance of such spaces, and community mobilization, for putting food on the agenda of local governments and pushing for transformative, bottom-up food systems changes. At the same time, and despite many efforts, important challenges and limitations remain, especially with regard to including marginalised groups within these spaces and enabling their voices to be heard. 

The toolkit aims to foster a more comprehensive human rights approach to addressing food system challenges from the bottom-up and promoting inclusive governance structures. It aims to contribute to our collective understanding of strategically engaging with food systems at the local level in Europe and fostering strategies to ensure stronger bottom-up governance at the European Union (EU) level. It explores the potential for multi-level architecture of food systems policies and governance structures and examines how regional policies impact local policymaking.

The mapping, interactive map and toolkit are also available in other languages:

Mapping: French, German, Portuguese and Swedish

Interactive map: French, German, Portuguese and Swedish

Toolkit: French, German, Portuguese and Swedish