A Nordic-Baltic framework for sustainable food systems

Today’s Nordic-Baltic food systems are not sustainable neither from an ecological point of view nor from a socioeconomic perspective, and preparedness for crises is generally low. Nordic and Baltic countries have to cope with major diet-related health problems – food poverty on the one hand and overweight and obesity on the other – intensive agricultural production, biodiversity loss, pollution, greenhouse gas emissions, impact on aquatic health, a high reliance on food and fuel imports and the fact that the agriculture and transport sectors continue to be highly gendered, just to cite a few of them.

Building upon the necessity to urgently establish Nordic-Baltic sustainable food systems and drawing inspiration from the expertise gained through a previously NKJ funded project (The role of Nordic research in transition to sustainable agro-marine food systems), this project will be multidisciplinary and made up of several components:
1. the building of methodological and theoretical foundations for a novel database on Nordic-Baltic sustainable food systems (NB-SFSD)
2. two webinars on Nordic-Baltic sustainable food systems
3. a Nordic-Baltic side event inside an already well established event, Innofood, organized on a yearly basis by Ruralia Institute in Seinäjoki, Finland and aimed at discussing food innovations and the future of food
4. communication through a dedicated LinkedIn project page and social media
5. an open access scientific article aimed at identifying indicators gaps (at national and transnational level) which are necessary to bridge in order to give place to a Nordic-Baltic sustainable food systems database.

The consortium, led by University of Helsinki Ruralia Institute, covers all the major areas connected to sustainable food systems and is made up of eight partners:
University of Helsinki Ruralia Institute
The Natural Resources Institute Finland
Consumption Research Norway, Oslo Metropolitan University
University of Copenhagen
Kost Studio
University of Faroe Islands
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
Estonian Business School

The Network is financed together with the partner organisations and The Nordic Joint Committee for Agricultural and Food Research (NKJ).