Bristol's Local Food Update
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BRISTOL’s lOCAL FOOD UPDATE COMMUNITY PROJECT NEWS · COURSES · PUBLICATIONS · EVENTS JANUARY–FEBRUARY 2016 New Year – New Look. We’ve given our website an overdue overhaul (with more content coming soon) and spruced-up the newsletter. Your help in making things even better would be welcomed. Let us know what else you’d like to see featured: www.bristolfoodnetwork.org Please email any suggestions for content of the March–April newsletter to [email protected] by 12 February. Food Connections needs you! Festival call-out for your event ideas. with ideas for events that they would like and wild food walks in Knowle, Blaise to run as part of the festival programme. Estate and Brandon Hill, but there are City-wide festival Food Connections is Events must help Food Connections so many more communities in Bristol returning to Bristol for its third year from achieve its goal of connecting people with and ideas to explore. Food Connections 28 April–7 May. The festival aims to bring each other and with good food in some people and good food together through is about including the whole of Bristol way. Successful event ideas will receive a programme of more than 100 events so the organisers are keen to hear from the help and support they need to sit taking place across the whole city over residents in all areas. alongside the main city centre events that nine days. will be taking place over the Bank Holiday The deadline for event idea submissions The event doesn’t follow the usual food weekend. is 20 January. To submit your idea, all you festival format; instead it encourages need to do is visit the Food Connections The festival organisers are looking and enables individuals, communities website and fill out the form. Successful for ideas that fall under six themes of and organisations to host their own event ideas will receive the support and Wellbeing, Families, Brain Food, Get events that are curated as part of the advice needed to host their event during Cooking, Land & Growing and Feasting wider programme. the festival. & Festivities. Past events have included a This year the organisers are calling for Spice Festival in Easton, a coffee rave in www.bristolfoodconnections.com/ the people of Bristol to come forward St Werburghs, a Hoedown in Bedminster event-ideas Food Route Local READ MORE PEOPLE CAN PAY THEIR PARKING FINES WITH CANS OF FOOD FOR “Waste Not, Want Not, especially problems are huge and not going away THE HUNGRY this Christmas” Says Bristol 2015 any time soon; latest estimates reveal DIGEST: Kentucky are running a ‘food Food Waste Legacy Project. New text that despite the reduction in the number for fines’ scheme accepting items alert service reroutes surplus food of landfill sites in the UK, waste food for foodbanks instead of money for into bellies not bins. produces 21 million tonnes of greenhouse parking fines. gas annually, with these emissions set to Food Route Local, a ‘surplus food www.goodnewsnetwork.org/ last for decades. redistribution service’, is asking people-can-pay-parking-fines-with- independent, local food producers, who The post-Christmas period after all the cans-of-food-in-ky have yet to discover the new service, to excesses, is the perfect time for Food get in touch now to avoid excessive waste Route Local to share its positive message STUDY EXPOSES GAP IN GLOBAL and make a difference, this Christmas. and make a difference. “That’s the joy of CLIMATE POLICY AS COUNTRIES it too.” remarks Reeves. “In helping local COMMIT TO ACTION ON AGRICULTURE The idea behind Food Route Local, a independent producers and suppliers Bristol 2015 European Green Capital DIGEST: Developing countries reduce the amount of unwanted food legacy project, is simple: can boost food production while headed for the bin, we might also be reducing greenhouse gas emissions “Whilst big food retailers are working enabling a community group to have a from agriculture, given the right with various organisations on surplus celebration they could otherwise ill afford. technologies and financial support. food projects nationally, the volumes of Surely that’s the true spirit of Christmas in www.fcrn.org.uk/research-library/ food involved generally excludes small action anyway.” study-exposes-gap-global-climate- producers and organisations. We realised Whether you are a local, independent policy-countries-commit-action- no one was bridging the local food waste food producer, supplier, grower etc. agriculture gap, enabling local food suppliers to who would like to see your surplus donate their surplus, in-date food to local go to ‘bellies not bins’ or a charitable, THE FOOD FOUNDATION PUBLISHED community organisations who could use community or other non-profit INITIAL RESPONSE TO UK it.” says Jacqui Reeves of FareShare South organisation who would like to receive GOVERNMENT’s sPENDING REVIEW West, who has co-developed the unique offers of free food through the Food service in partnership with community DIGEST: The response focusses on Route Local text alert service please go to food-growing organisation Incredible the Review’s implications for food the website and follow the Sign Up links. Edible Bristol. insecurity and public health spending. www.fcrn.org.uk/research-library/ Fast forward several months and the food-foundation-published- 6 month project pilot is already underway, initial-response-uk-government’s- allowing the likes of Boston Tea Party, spending-review Pieminister and The Real Olive Company to offer their surplus produce by sending HOW TO END BRITain’s desTRUCTIVE a simple text message. That message ADDICTION TO FOOD BANKS is then relayed to every organisation registered to receive these offers from http://foodroutelocal.org DIGEST: Tim Lang discusses two Food Route Local. Twitter: @foodroutelocal recent reports that have been Facebook: Facebook.com/foodroutelocal published discussing food poverty and “We take a step back then, and leave the food banks in Britain. two organisations to make their pick-up FareShare South West is an https://theconversation.com/ arrangements themselves. Apart from independent franchise of the national how-to-end-britains-destructive- keeping our costs to a minimum, we hope charity, FareShare, working in and around addiction-to-food-banks-50096 doing it this way will facilitate stronger Bristol. They work with the food industry relationships all the way along the local to minimise fit-for-purpose fresh, frozen WHY OSAGE-ORANGE TREES? food supply chain.” explains Sara Venn, and long-life food going to waste, and WHY HERE? WHY NOW? Incredible Edible Bristol project lead. send this food into organisations working “When 13 million people in the UK are DIGEST: Part of an ongoing series with the most vulnerable people in the struggling to afford to eat, yet a third about the post-modern hedgerow community. of food never gets eaten, you know and its uses in the landscape. something is very wrong with it nationally.” http://faresharesouthwest.org.uk/ www.ecologicalgardening. she adds. Incredible Edible Bristol (IEB) is an net/2015/12/why-osage-orange- trees-why-here-why-now.html The recent 2-part BBC TV documentary independent, community food-growing movement in the form of a constituted Hugh’s War On Waste has been invaluable OF PIGS, PEASANTS & PASTORALISTS for raising awareness about the food community group (unincorporated waste problem. Shocking, nonsensical association) and part of a global network DIGEST: A redesign for British practices have been exposed all the way of Incredible Edible communities with a agriculture. through the modern food system, from broad common goal – the growing of local http://smallfarmfuture.org. farms to supermarkets to individuals to food, freely available for all. uk/?p=900 landfill. Whilst progress is being made, the http://ediblebristol.org.uk/ 2 · bristol’s local food update · january–february 2016 Refill Bristol GUS HOYT Refill Bristol is a simple and effective throw-away plastic bottles by providing Both of our Universities are vying to see campaign which everyone can join free drinking water, Refill Bristol fitted the who can get the most students engaged in with. Our objectives may be lofty bill perfectly. The team was funded, key and involved and with such a high student but the premise is simple – we want partners confirmed and a special dance retention rate in the city this can only get to make Bristol a city where drinking routine choreographed for the public better. water is free, and even without engagement and launch! 2016 will be an interesting year as other water fountains on every corner, City to Sea teamed with Go Green and cities are asking us to run Refill campaigns everyone can fill-up their water local water charity FRANK Water to elsewhere whilst we still have much work bottles wherever they are in the city. sign up Refill Stations across the city to do in Bristol. We’re excited about the The average Brit will spend around centre and in high streets further afield. prospect of Ashton Gate being active £23,000 on take-away drinks in their Wherever you see the blue sticker in cafes champions. Talks with the Airport seem to lifetime, mostly in plastic bottles. Of these and businesses then you know you’re be going well and, we need to ensure the only about 20% are ever recycled, the rest welcome to ask for a free refill of your new Arena is not only signed up to Refill end up in landfill or worse, in our oceans water bottle – no purchase necessary. Bristol but has a strategy to eliminate the where they never go away. Every piece of tonnes of single-use plastics other venues plastic ever made is still in existence and The behaviour change we’re after is that generate every year.