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AGRF 2023: Time for Food System Leadership

by Kate Simpson/

AGRF 2023: Time for Food System Leadership

Brenda Mareri
Claudia Piacenza

Brenda Mareri &
Claudia Piacenza

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A leadership gap is limiting the transformation of Africa’s food system

We (Team Wasafiri’s Claudia & Brenda) have just returned from the Africa Food Systems Forum (AGRF) 2023 in Dar es Salaam Tanzania, where we had an incredible week connecting with food system actors on the continent.

It was exciting to see that it is now mainstream to talk about food as a system; that we collectively have moved beyond agriculture production as the only issue that matters.

Taking a system view isn’t just a matter of being more in vogue or with the zeitgeist, but has a real-world practical impact on the way we understand the complexities of food. It is through a systems view that we can understand, for example, the impact of empowering women (who are the majority of the worlds’ farmers) to employ climate are the real word complexities of food systems and just focusing on one dimension – such as increased production, increased incomes, or climate adaptation may make action feel reassuringly achievable but is a mirage in terms of real transformation.

Brenda & Claudia at AGRF 2023
Wasafiri's Brenda Mareri and Claudia Piacenza at AGRF 2023

We were also pleasantly surprised to see that soil health is no longer a topic only for geeky soil scientists in a corner, but the subject of several conversations that focus on the “how” rather than the “why”.

Smallholder farmers were acknowledged, mentioned, and celebrated as the backbone of the industry but not yet seen and served as the main clients of that industry. How do we move from smallholders as ‘beneficiaries’ of well-meaning interventions designed to ameliorate the impacts of an industrial food system that is built to serve large scale producers – and into the place where smallerholders hold more of the power within food systems?

Chefs from all over the world united their creative minds and sapient hands to elevate “poor” ingredients like beans to demonstrate that healthy diets do not have to be affordable only for middle-class, urban consumers.

And yet despite this great breadth of knowledge, creativity, inspiration and expertise, we are still dealing with incredibly stubborn problems as the Africa Agriculture Status Report reminds us. Why is that?

A big part of the answer lies in the need for a different kind of leadership. Systemic leadership was lacking at the AGRF. We saw a large showcase of good intentions but very little sense-making and collaboration at a level that can truly advance systemic change. Food System transformation requires a deep appreciation of the interconnections not just between the people that produce, process, transport, sell and consume food but also the relationship to the natural world that is the genesis of it all. No one leader, institution, company, or government, however well-intentioned and well-resourced is going to be able to transform a food system alone. It just can’t be done. Collective action is the only form of action that is going to work – and this needs network-driven forms of leadership where collaboration is not an optional activity but the default mode.

Finally, we have a serious problem with the representational status of African rulers who are often over 60, while the average African is 20 years old. And we still do not have enough women leaders with access to the power they need and deserve to nurture collective change at scale. We need to talk about it and support a new generation of African leaders for Food Systems.

The African Food Fellowship is investing in African Food System leaders in Kenya and Rwanda. We are starting to see how leaders can transform food systems in their countries towards more equitable, sustainable, and healthy outcome. Reach out if you want to know more!

If you enjoyed this blog then try this one about speeding up Food System Transformation 

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The cost-of-living crisis: building more collective responses

by Kate Simpson/

The cost-of-living crisis: building more collective responses

Kate Simpson

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The UK cost-of-living crisis is a complex problem.

  • It has multiple root causes (inflation, the war in Ukraine, fuel prices, long-term economic trends and more).
  • It is dynamic so it is changing and shifting as we work on it.
  • No single institution can solve it alone (however powerful well intentioned or well-resourced they are). It is a problem that will only give in to collective action.
  • And finally, some of the reasons it is so hard to shift is that there are trade-offs. Putting up wages puts pressure on inflation (and raises costs). Higher taxes have both political and economic implications, likewise with greater subsidies for things like energy costs.

For these reasons, there are no simple answers to the cost-of living crisis; no silver bullet solutions to reach for.

So, what do we do next?

In moments like this, when faced with problems with a high degree of complexity and uncertainty about ‘who should do what’, we need to stop calling for other people to ‘do something’ and start building better collective responses.

Complex problems by their nature need collective actions. We need actions that vary by context – that are adapted for different social groups, regions and the different ways that the cost-of-living crisis is driven and experienced.

Wasafiri has been supporting a range of organisations and clients with their work to build more collective responses to the Cost-of-Living Crisis:

  1. The Forward Institute has convened leaders from across some of the UK’s leading public, private and not-for-profit organisations. And together they are sharing ideas, collaborating and getting practical with their response.
  2. Brighton & Hove City Council convened a summit (facilitated by Wasafiri) that brought key partners together to align and coordinate support, share information and identify ideas and actions to strengthen a collective response. The large turnout demonstrated the high levels of motivation to work more collectively across the city.

Across this work we are noticing a few trends:

  • The cost-of-living crisis cannot be solved at the individual level – food banks, personal finance advice, low-interest loans for travel passes, and even home insulation are all things that will help people to live in the current context but won’t change the context. They are useful and important, but they are a response to the presenting problem – not an attempt to shift its causes.
  • Local collective action – the specific drivers and experiences of the cost-of-living crisis vary by geographic region but also industry, demographics, and a whole host of other variables. Consequently, responses need to be equally varied.

    For example, in Cumbria, a rural area in the north of England, there is a lot of available employment but the cost of transport is a significant barrier to people accessing it. The current (government-funded) experiment to cap bus prices at a flat £2 has more than halved the cost of bus transport in the region and opened up employment opportunities. 

    For an even more innovative (and artistic) attempt to take a collective response check out Power, a project to get a street in London to become its own green power station. The Power project is a recognition that the incentives for individuals to invest in things like solar panels just don’t stack up. On top of this there are significant barriers for individuals including finding suppliers, dealing with planning permissions, having the upfront cash to invest. By taking a collective approach the logistics and the financial incentives are shifted and a sense of belonging and community is created.

Let’s look to the long term

 

The cost-of-living crisis is a symptom of an underlying system driven (in part) by a dependency on carbon-based energy. We know that we need to change this.

As the cost-of-living crisis stimulates us to change the way we do things – like how we build our homes, use transport, the food we eat, the energy we consume, the products we reuse (or never use) – let’s make these changes not just to get us through this storm but to help us adapt and move towards a more sustainable and even regenerative future.

Join our community of system change leaders.

To learn more about Systemcraft, our approach to complex change, and how to use it in your work – sign up for our online course.

Photo by Sarah Agnew on Unsplash

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What might a systems approach to leadership mean for each of us?

by Hamish Wilson/

Talk is commonplace of how systems approaches can solve complex problems. But how might it help leaders make real world decisions? How might it help leaders like you?

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From systems thinking to systems doing: How to tackle our toughest problems

by Hamish Wilson/

The world is not short of models for systems change. Many of these models are right and a few of them are useful. The World Business Council for Sustainability (WBCS) has just published a brief on ‘Unlocking systems transformation’ (LINK here) – which falls well into the ‘useful’ category.

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