GSS EU Science Funding Gateway

Urban lifestyles have led to more consumption of ultra-processed and packaged food. Cooking skills may enhance healthy and sustainable diets, so supporting consumers provides potential. There are also indications, that social change might be enhanced by encouraging minorities to publicly challenge unsustainable norms during social interactions. This potential can be exploited to drive change in behaviour by citizen engagement.

Proposals are expected to address the following:

• Develop tools and applications that enhance citizens to have a healthy and sustainable food provision, diet and treating of food at home/ or discourage unhealthy and unsustainable choices that can be considered by national policy makers and private actors;
• Include in approaches ‘culinary culture dimension’ such as based on nationality, religion, culture, regionality and seasonality etc., and time and financial constraints;
• Engage citizens in solutions to create inclusive and sustainable solutions for broad uptake;
• Ensure that national nutritional policies and advice are respected as well as food safety;
• Link solutions to the issue of food waste and to the need to reduce household wastes generally, notably plastics, as part of a circular economy to include all aspects of sustainability tools that can be considered by national policy makers for implementation;
• Take a holistic approach, e.g., delivery (including prepared meals, micro deliveries, decentralised pick-up points) including transport and distribution aspects, short supply chains, marketing, sustainable packaging, recycling and reduction in food waste;
• Develop a sample plan to make available to Member State and Associated Countries authorities for several countries on how to enhance uptake of beneficial tools and applications considering different socio-economic characteristics of citizens and national laws.