FoodFutures coordinator, Anna Clayton, reflects on 2024’s spring into action events whilst also sharing plans for the future.
North Lancashire’s Spring Into Action week of events in April saw more than 300 people come together to celebrate our region’s Silver Sustainable Food Places Award.
To mark this special occasion and the culmination of five years of work, local poet Sarah Hymas wrote ‘The Alchemists of North Lancashire: In Their Own Words’; a poem that tried to capture the energy of North Lancashire’s emerging food projects and networks. Filberts Bakery created a seasonal rhubarb and magnolia petal cake and Charlotte Done from the Good Things Collective created a piece of artwork to say thank you to the many people and organisations that have supported our local sustainable food movement to flourish.
Rachel Marshall, Closing Loops Project Coordinator and Eggcup Trustee commented: “It felt special to turn up to a celebration of what we have done together. A real mixture of people joined in e.g. it was so great to see a kale farmer sat next to a conservation grazier and food club member for example. And people also weren’t there! I liked how the poem saw Sarah go out and meet groups, make new connections and have some really nice conversations, and the events afterwards had a really good energy.”
Not only did these festivities bring a diversity of people together to celebrate, to share learnings and build new connections and ideas, but they involved lots of practical activities too: fermenting, mushroom growing, foraging, composting, garden designing, skill sharing, gaming and strategising. These activities have sparked action and have sown seeds that will hopefully emerge with time as new collaborations, projects, activities and pollinator friendly flowers!
Just as an example, 30kg of surplus Mooli have since been shared by Libby Flintoff Organics with local projects Global Link and Claver Hill. These have been transformed into kimchi and tried, in many cases for the first time, in a variety of different recipes.
Where events got booked up (foraging, preserving and mushroom growing), there are now plans to run these on a more regular basis and in partnership.
The week galvanised support for Going For Gold, with all FoodFutures working groups and poll results saying: Let’s work towards a Sustainable Food Places Gold Award, but let’s do the work anyway!
And all FoodFutures working groups have since agreed their two year strategic priorities that will continue the work of building a more “healthy, resilient and fair” food system, whilst supporting North Lancashire on its Golden journey. You can now explore these priorities at FoodFutures Working Groups.
