Food Policy: Inconvenient truths

A report of the July 2008 meeting of the FEC’s Business Forum

On 7th July 2008, the UK government launched ‘Food Matters: Towards a Strategy for the 21st Century’. The July meeting of the Food Ethics Council’s (FEC) Business Forum discussed the report, focusing on its toughest messages for the food sector and for government.

The meeting was chaired by Helen Browning OBE, Food and Farming Director of the Soil Association and chair of the FEC.

We are very grateful to Andrew Jarvis, Deputy Director in the Cabinet Office Strategy Unit (COSU) and leader of the team that produced the report, for speaking and for fielding questions.

Key points from the meeting include:

• The Prime Minister commissioned the COSU to examine government’s approach to food policy. ‘Food Matters’ tackles 4 sets of challenges: economics and equity; health; food safety; and the environment.
• It commits to three areas of action: supporting consumers; working with industry to tackle market failures; and improving public procurement by introducing a ‘Healthier Food Mark’.
• It is the government’s strongest statement of the range and depth of challenges facing the food sector. Government’s mandate to address these problems depends on stakeholder support.
• Joined up policy is easier said than done. Government does not work by command and control. Co-ordinating and communicating consumer advice is a first step, but not enough.
• The problems are serious and we cannot afford to be distracted eg efforts to tackle greenhouse gas emissions should target real hotspots.
• The food sector does not have all the tools to solve its own problems.
• It has a responsibility to support more system-wide interventions.
• It is awash with competing visions of a better world.
• ‘Food Matters’ challenges the industry and other stakeholders to focus on mechanisms and to keep an open mind.