Everything you need to know about Bold Actions for Food as a Force for Good

Nov 17, 2020

Image: Dan Gold/Unsplash

Sean de Cleene

Member of the Executive Committee, Head of the Future of Food, World Economic Forum

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This article is part of: Bold Actions for Food as a Force for Good

Bold Actions for Food as a Force for Good will occur online 23-24 November.
It will convene leaders from governments, business, civil society, international organizations alongside innovators, financiers, experts, scientists, entrepreneurs and youth to initiate and accelerate action for food systems transformation.
It will be an important initial multistakeholder convening in direct support of the 2021 UN Food Systems Summit.
Key themes include safe and nutritious food for all, nature-positive production, equitable livelihoods, sustainable consumption patterns, and resilience.

To feed more than 10 billion people within our planetary boundaries by 2050, while ending hunger and tackling unhealthy diets, we will have to fundamentally change the food system, requiring co-ordinated and large-scale action by all stakeholders across multiple axes.

Earlier this year UN Secretary-General António Guterres announced he will be convening a Food Systems Summit in September 2021.

“It is unacceptable that hunger is on the rise at a time when the world wastes more than 1 billion tonnes of food every year," he said. "It is time to change how we produce and consume, including to reduce greenhouse emissions. Transforming food systems is crucial for delivering all the Sustainable Development Goals. As a human family, a world free of hunger is our imperative.”

Bold Actions for Food as a Force for Good is a key milestone in the path towards the UN Food Systems Summit. The fully virtual event builds on outputs of other key events and discussions and aims to provide concrete, multistakeholder input into priorities, challenges, opportunities and game-changing solutions.

What is Bold Actions for Food as a Force for Good?

Bold Actions for Food as a Force for Good aims to support preparations for the UN Food Systems Summit. Concretely, the event will seek to:

Create a global network of leaders at all levels to drive transformative change for sustainable food systems.
Identify a set of scalable, ‘game changer’ initiatives to achieve a sustainable foods system and outlining the partnerships, funding and innovation hubs that would be needed to implement them to put forward to the Summit.
Focus dialogue on an initial set of science-based principles to change the foods system that could be adopted between now and the UN Food Systems Summit 2021.

Additionally, the event offers a unique and timely opportunity to provide Food Systems Summit leaders, including Agnes Kalibata, UN Special Envoy, United Nations Food Systems Summit, a stage to explain the purpose and process of the summit to a broad multistakeholder audience.

The event is designed to explore interactions, synergies and trade-offs within and between the summit's five action tracks: ensuring access to safe and nutritious food for all, shifting to sustainable consumption patterns, boosting nature-positive production, advancing equitable livelihoods, and building resilience to vulnerabilities, shocks and stress.

The virtual event is hosted by 13 organizations: the World Economic Forum, World Business Council For Sustainable Development, World Farmers Organisation, Unilever, Rabobank, DSM, PepsiCo, Wageningen University & Research, Tufts University’s Friedman School of Nutrition Science, GAIN, One Young World, International Fund for Agricultural Development, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands.

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What’s on the agenda?

In this spirit, content for the event is split across five key themes, reflecting the five action tracks, including:

Key sessions include:

A Vision for Food Systems of the Future: This live-streamed plenary session will show the views of people involved in and affected by the food system – from young people to farmers to heads of state and celebrities – to mobilize awareness of and support for the urgency of food system transformation.
Building a Stronger Food System: This session will be focused around key issues and priorities to be addressed by each of the five action tracks designated by the UN Food Systems Summit Secretariat, as well as the levers of change. These sessions will focus on existing – and potentially game-changing – initiatives and solutions and the enabling environment needed to scale them for impact.
Bold Actions for Change: Multiple sessions hosted by event co-hosts and partners will provide a deeper dive into existing solutions and issues, taking a thematic, solution-based and/or regional lens.
Innovation Challenges: Wageningen University and other organizations will host sessions featuring new innovations from young entrepreneurs.
Closing Plenary: This session will focus on priorities and commitments from multiple stakeholders.

How can I follow it?

As an individual, you can participate in the summit by becoming a World Economic Forum Digital Member (one-month free access), which will provide access to the programme. (If you are already a member of the World Economic Forum, you can register for the summit on TopLink.) Learn more here.

During the meeting, we will publish articles by participants on our content platform, Agenda. You can also keep up-to-date on the developments on social media using the hashtag #BoldActions4Food. You can find us on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, YouTube and TikTok.

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The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.