Be a climate shaper: Future Food for Climate Smart Cities starts today in New York

Today New York, the Collab innovation & design hub spaces, welcome the first international summer school dedicated to sustainable and resilient urban communities. Starting from the Future Food for Climate Change initiative, aimed to advance global awareness around food and the climate while connecting innovation around the world, the New York-based summer school will be the first educational course of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and Future Food Institute joint activities. Indeed, the agreement includes a joint program aimed at promoting food innovation as a lever to generate and accelerate social, cultural, economic and environmental impact.

The Joint Program begins by spreading knowledge and training specific skills necessary to mitigate the climate crisis starting from innovation applied to the agri-food sector. During the summer school, that will take place in New York until July 17th, 15 participants will join academics, institutional and business delegates to discuss methodologies and practices to implement sustainable ideas in cities, thanks to a huge amount of case histories on food waste, urban farming, and social inclusion.

The summer school attendants will also carry out their learning outcomes by thematic workshops to prototype new models of social change. Three of the participants come from Hack for SDGs, the first FAO and Future Food Institute hackathon on the 17 Sustainable Development Goals launched at EXCO 2019 in collaboration with PRIMA.

A relevant moment for all the summer school attendants will happen on July 12th, during an inspirational event for the first World Food Loss and Waste Day. The first part of the day will be a debate in the UN with those actors that are engaged in actively fighting food loss and waste with the aim of defining what type of action could be undertaken at the UN and international level to reach the objective of SDG 12, including the desirability of declare an international day for reducing food loss and waste.

The second part will be a direct exposure of the UN system to the reality of food loss and waste with a visit to the Google Kitchens in NY followed by a reception with the celebrity Once-Homeless Chef Using Food to Fight Poverty Marc Brand to see how the fight takes place in reality and to raise awareness of its actual benefits and challenges.

Some of the main speakers of the UN event will be Sara Roversi, founder of the Future Food Institute,  the LeanPath Vice-President Steven Finn and Mike Wolf, Smart Kitchen Summit founder.

Every attendant of the Summer School will also receive an official climate shaper certificate from Future Food and FAO. A climate shaper is a professional who will shape and mitigate the climate crisis, starting from ag-food tech solutions. He/She will also be able to:

• • Inspire the community, both local and global;
  • Help people learn about the current food-related risks of our vulnerable planet in a scalable and versatile perspective, through case histories, data, and professional knowledge;
  • Regenerate the environment through concrete climate actions and resilient solutions for the agrifood sector, relating to the different scopes of our vibrant ecosystems; 
  • Support communities and organizations facilitating the transition toward the sustainable development framework;
  • Innovate within the current food-system through disruptive ideas inspired by real stories;
  • Make an impact on the whole food supply chain through climate-smart projects, from everyday life to wide joint strategies and initiatives.

Strategic Partners

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations [FAO]  The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations [FAO] and the Future Food Institute [FFI] are developing a joint advanced learning programme including hands on experience supported by a series of FAO elearning courses, multilingual, accessible to all, anytime, anywhere, to transfer knowledge, skills and competencies and strengthen the capacities of the professionals of today and tomorrow

Youth Climate Leaders Network  YCL is building an intergenerational movement to catalyze climate action by providing youth with training, networks and concrete opportunities to start their careers in the field of climate change. Future Food Institute is supporting the network to get young people the right skills to act, networks and legitimacy to have a meaningful contribution. Youth Climate Leaders will soon open a branch at the FF Living Lab in Bologna.  

Agenda

The complete agenda of the event is available HERE Follow the Summer School on our Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn accounts using the hashtags #ff4cc #summerschool and #climatesmartcities