Bristol Food Links

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Bristol Food Links is an umbrella organisation working to promote healthy, sustainable and affordable food across the City. Founded in the mid-90's, as part of Voscur, Bristol Food Links aims to bring together a variety of sectors to support community food initiatives in their work across the City.

Bristol Food Links ran out of funding in 2005, and since early 2007 a small Task Group has been meeting to re-establish the organisation. In January 2008 Bristol City Council’s Environment and Sustainability Unit provided some funding to develop an organisational plan and funding bid for a new and re-energised Bristol Food Links.

Events

Please click here to see October's update
from Claire Milne, Sustainable Food Coordinator at Bristol City Council Environment and Sustainability Team.

 For the previous Autumn update please click here:

Update includes:

  • Seeking land for food growing and / or production
  • Eat the Change: a week of local organic food, free from plastic packaging
  • Share the Harvest: celebrating local food in and around Bristol
  • Involving marginalised and excluded groups in sustainability projects
  • Knowle West Food Fayre
  • Film Showing - the Power of Community: how Cuba survived peak oil through organis agriculture
  • DIY Green / Edible Roof Day
  • Organic Gardening Courses at Windmill Hill City Farm
  • Meet the buyers events for food businesses interested in supplying the public sector
  • Healthy eating resources for multi-cultural communities being developed
  • South Gloucestershire Local Food Festival
  • Community Supported Agriculture Training Event
  • Funding News
  • Local Food Mapping - Job Vacancy
  • What's in Season?
  • On-going events and activities.

Please send any updates or events for the next mailing to: claire.milne@bristol.gov.uk.

 

Funding event for community food initiatives

Was held on Monday 10 March 2008, 9.30 – 3pm at The Southville Centre, Beauley Road, Southville, Bristol.

This event saw some 60 organisations from across Bristol come together to discuss how to work together to transform Bristol into a hub of healthy, sustainable and affordable food. A wide range of interests were represented, but an exciting and common goal shared by all was to make food in Bristol work for the benefit of both people and the planet.

Sustainable food across Bristol
Joy Carey, Soil Association’s Head of Local Food, gave a great introduction to the importance of local food in terms of both sustainability and the challenges faced by local communities around food’s role in their health, local environment and economy.

Mapping food work across the City
Exciting progress was made in mapping what work is already happening to promote healthy, sustainable, affordable food across Bristol. Not only did this allow everyone to celebrate the work already happening, but it importantly also identified various gaps across the City where we need to initiate new projects, learning from existing good practice.

Assessing projects’ support needs
Vast amounts of information was gathered on the problems community projects are facing in terms of their work around food. Bristol Food Links is now analysing this information to explore how best to respond to this and support projects to transform food in Bristol.

Developing joint funding bids
Crucial to transforming food across Bristol is a joined up approach, capitalising on the wealth of ideas and experience held by Bristol’s myriad community projects. The day saw an exciting range of ideas materialising around how projects can best work together. Subsequent meetings are already being planned to take these ideas forward.

Watch this space for more detailed feedback from the event and for information about how to get involved in the discussions about taking funding bids forward.

Contact Claire Milne on Claire.milne@bristol.gov.uk or 07824 878904 to:

- Find out more about Bristol Food Links and this event
- Let Bristol Food Links know about your food related work or your support needs around this.

News

UN’s Conference on World Food Security and Climate Change

World leaders are coming to Rome to attend the High-Level Conference on
World Food Security: the Challenges of Climate Change and Bioenergy to
be held 3-5 June 2008. Across the world food prices are soaring thanks
to the absurdity of our current globalised food system. Yet food
security is not only an issue for ‘poor’ countries – the health and
wellbeing of communities across Bristol is also being seriously
comprised by the food we eat. At a time when oil prices are
sky-rocketing because supplies are running thin, and the nation’s
health is in crisis thanks to our processed-food diets, it is essential
that we start growing and cooking our own food if we are to protect the
planet and regain our health and vitality.

In solidarity with communities across the world, Bristol’s Week of
Seasonal Food Celebrations (see Events section above) will be raising
awareness about the important issues being addressed at the UN’s
Conference on World Food Security and Climate Change.