Lecce: "Common Food", the project for the adoption of the Food Plan presented

Lecce: "Common Food", the project for the adoption of the Food Plan presented.

The project was presented at Palazzo Carafa “Common Food”, financed by the Puglia Region as part of the Puglia Participation Notice 2022, managed by Ce.FAS, with the partnership of the entities that signed the protocol for the Food Policy of the city of Lecce: Slow food Lecce, Oltre Mercato Salento and the Municipality of Lecce.

The project is aimed at adopting the Food Plan of the City of Lecce, i.e. a strategic document that indicates the orientations, guidelines and actions necessary to guarantee the citizens of Lecce a healthy, sustainable diet, primarily of local production and to the consequent establishment of the Food Council, made up of citizens, public institutions, associations, players in the fish-agri-food sector. The Plan will be the result of a participatory process, preceded by stakeholder mapping and two public debates on the theme "Lecce: Food, territory and sustainability", the dates of which will be announced in September.

The participatory phase of the project “Common food” will be divided into six participatory workshops in which discussion tables will be activated on specific themes: "Food is health", with recipients the realities and professionals who work to promote sustainable diets and correct food choices will be held at the headquarters of 'Order of Doctors on 2 September at 9.00 am; “Food is knowledge and awareness”, with recipients consumer organisations, solidarity purchasing groups, will be held in Piazzale Cuneo on 8 August from 17pm; “Food is education”, with recipients the schools that will be involved in the process through the promotion of a competition for the definition of the logo of the food policy of the city of Lecce will be held at the Presta Columella Agricultural Institute on 16 September from 9.00 am; “Food is inclusion”, with recipients organizations operating in the social agriculture or hospitality sector (Cas, SAI, migrant communities) will be held on 21 September (time to be defined) in Piazzetta Balsamo; “Food is territory”, with the target audience being local food producers, distributors and processors, trade associations and land protection associations, will be held at the Tagghiate Urban Factory Park in Via dei Ferrari on 30 September from 18pm; “Food is circularity”, with recipients food recovery, reuse and recycling associations, the last event will be held at the Teatini.

At the same time, a participatory path aimed at children will be activated to be carried out with the photovoice technique in schools. At the end of the project, suggestions, indications and proposals emerging from the participatory process will flow into the Food Plan, which will be adopted by the Municipality of Lecce.

«The sustainability of food systems is a global issue on which we measure ourselves as a community, doing our part – declares the mayor Carlo Salvemini – Because everyone must become the protagonist of a possible change in the name of reducing waste, pollution, and protecting individual and public health. Reaching the city's adoption of a Food Plan, with the aim of promoting and supporting healthy and sustainable food styles and consumption, is a commitment that our administration is committed to."

«As a Municipality we have taken up a challenge presented to us by the partners – declares the councilor for Productive Activities Paolo Foresio – and we started a discussion about food. We have involved a series of other partners who deal with the food production chain, the sports chain, well-being, correct lifestyles, health, to tackle a job that has the objective in particular of an educational activity aimed at children and to school girls who we consider an investment in the future. Today we enter the second step of this path, presenting a series of actions that will start from September and will lead us to the establishment of the Food Council."

«The choices we make every day through the choice of food have a very important impact on many aspects: from health to the environment, to social justice – he declares Sergio Longo of the Slow Food Convivium of Lecce – We live on a planet inhabited by 8 billion people, we produce food that would be enough to feed around 12 billion. Despite this, one billion malnourished and undernourished people live on Earth. Surplus food production generates environmental impacts when it is produced and further impacts when it must be disposed of. We live in a system that needs to be governed better, orienting production and consumption choices towards greater awareness, giving food back centrality in the sense of the community of local production, of production with a lower environmental impact, of health protection above all of young people and children".

«The change that we want to accelerate with this initiative is the result of a real urgency and not of a whim – declares Virginia Meo of Oltremercato – We wanted to unite three different associations with different histories that work on the topic of food and food sovereignty because we believe that in the city of Lecce there are positive energies that can be networked to build different local policies. Health, culture, environment, development, inclusion are the key words of a path that will concern everything and everyone, speaking to businesses, citizens, schools and associations."

«In the next six months we will follow a path whose objective is the establishment of the Food Council, an aggregate of citizens, companies, associations who will sit with the administration to define together the strategies for the next few years related to food policies – he declares Fabrizio Chetrì by Ce.FAS – We will be in the city with informative events related to themes such as circularity, health, physical well-being and sport, inclusion and participatory workshops on themes and strategies of the Food Plan».