[Rosemary]

“Feeding the Five Million: what would it take for everyone in Scotland to eat well and sustainably?”
For more information or to register interest please email: conference2013@nourishscotland.org.uk
Bookings can be made at the eventbrite website: http://feedingthefivemillion.eventbrite.co.uk

It’s easy to make sweeping statements about what needs to happen globally, but harder to work out the details.  So, this conference is to talk and think about Scotland – a small, wealthy, well-governed country blessed with some productive soils and plenty of water, with skilled farmers and fishers, world-leading science and a strong social fabric.

And food banks.  And a population which dies on average four years younger than the European average, with huge inequalities across Scotland.

Scotland’s food exports are strong – we export £12bn of food every year, while we only eat around £9bn worth ourselves.  But our food system is failing in some major ways.  This conference aims to come up with solutions that are innovative, yet practical and imaginative yet doable!

So while we are discussing possible futures for Scotland, inside or outside the UK, this conference explores the scope for a better food system.  Public money is already being spent – on our health service, our farming subsidies, on cleaning up nitrogen and pesticides, and in our public kitchens.  Could we spend it better?

This conference takes the form of a two-day enquiry.  Teams from different backgrounds will work together to explore these issues and produce a report which will subsequently be edited and published. Teams will have access to a variety of witnesses including people from all parts of the food system and academics from a variety of fields.

Participants will need to be able to attend the full two days, which includes an evening session with a keynote speaker and a delicious conference dinner of locally sourced, organic food.

Key witnesses already confirmed include:

Katherine Trebeck, Policy and Advocacy Manager, Oxfam UK Programmes and lead of author of the recent “Our Economy -Towards a New Prosperity” (http://policy-practice.oxfam.org.uk/publications/our-economy-towards-a-new-prosperity-294239 )
Robin McAlpine, Director of the Reid Foundation who initiated the Scottish Common Weal Project (http://scottishcommonweal.org)
Rachelle Faroul, Fresh Food For All Program Coordinator, Just Food, New York City (http://www.justfood.org)
Lesley Riddoch, Journalist and Broadcaster (http://www.lesleyriddoch.com) Lesley will chair the evening discussion on Tuesday 3rd September.
The conference fees will be flexible so that participants from different sectors can be included.

We hope that you will be able to join us for what should be an exciting two days which will help us move closer to a Scotland where all our citizens are fed healthily and sustainably!

[Beewyched]

Would have definitely gone to this if we hadn't needed to move back to Wales - looks really interesting 

[Rosemary]

I think I might go