Session 1. What is Food Policy?

Objectives

At the end of this session, you should be able to:

Ø Identify your role in the food chain

Ø Determine elements in Food Policy

Ø Describe outlines of a good Food Policy for Malta

‘Food and nutrition policy’ is a general term to mean the use of public policy measures to deliver improved public health. Much as there are foreign policies or economic policies, it is now recognised that there are food and nutrition policies. Sometimes these are explicit – set by governments – and sometimes they are implicit – a combination of private policies by industry agencies.

The subject and the practice of food and nutrition policy means that we have to link policy inputs from diverse sources. Two things follow from this:

1. If we want to formulate realistic but useful food and nutrition policies, we need to understand better how current food systems work;

2. We need to draw upon many academic disciplines: food science, nutrition, veterinary and human medicine, social and political sciences, economics, history.

1.1 Introduction

- Each introduce self

- Identify future role in food chain

- Food News (locally collected)

Make Connections

1.2 Trends

Activity: Describe 1) Food changes in last 20 years

2) Food changes expected in next 20 years

Discuss Context, Range, Quality, Price, Quantity, Availability, Fresh/Local, Sources, Future.

1.3 Food Policy

- What is food policy?

- Goals and Options

Develop a definition of “Food Policy”

1.4 The Actors and Forces

- state

- companies

- civil society

1.5 Outline “Food Policy

Discuss overall policy and Draw up an ideal/outline “Food Policy”

“Food Policy encompasses the collective efforts of governments to influence the decisionmaking environment of food producers, food consumers, and food marketing agents in order to further social objectives”. Timmer, C 1983