By Duncan Fisher, Our Food Trust
A regional approach to changing food systems is important. So has concluded a report published this month, Accelerating regional food systems change, by Fix Our Food (York University) and the Centre for Food Policy (London City St George’s University). The report is based on discussions at an international roundtable in London in October 2025. I attended, representing Our Food Trust.
Regional approaches can
- > deliver solutions unique to local conditions;
- > build networks and trust needed to effect change on the ground;
- > link urban and rural areas in joint work;
- > expand funding opportunities.
A key requirement for regional work is clearly recording, measuring and evaluating outcomes. This is why Future Farms Partnership has declared a very clear outcome – 100 new farming enterprises – so that we are accountable to everyone in a very immediate way.
The role of National Government, mainly Welsh Government in our case, is two-fold. First, national government can support regional action financially. Second, it can also help to make the case to local authorities of the importance of changing food systems, a task that is often not well understood in local government and can play second fiddle to economic development.
Another way, not covered in the report but experienced positively by us in Powys, is to design financial and business support to farms in way that supports newly starting small enterprises that serve local and regional markets.
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Growing more food in Powys for local and regional markets: policy briefing for Powys County Councillors, by Future Farms Partnership
Open letter from Black Mountain College students and alumni to public authorities – ‘let us farm!’
Making food security action happen in Powys
Future Farms Partnership raises its game: 100 farms
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