Introduction to Farm2Fork Strategy

1. Introduction to the topic:

The Farm to Fork Strategy is at the heart of the European Green Deal aiming to make food systems fair, healthy and environmentally-friendly.

Food systems cannot be resilient to crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic if they are not sustainable. We need to redesign our food systems which today account for nearly one-third of global GHG emissions, consume large amounts of natural resources, result in biodiversity loss and negative health impacts (due to both under- and over-nutrition) and do not allow fair economic returns and livelihoods for all actors, in particular for primary producers.

Putting our food systems on a sustainable path also brings new opportunities for operators in the food value chain. New technologies and scientific discoveries, combined with increasing public awareness and demand for sustainable food, will benefit all stakeholders.

The Farm to Fork Strategy aims to accelerate our transition to a sustainable food system that should:

• have a neutral or positive environmental impact
• help to mitigate climate change and adapt to its impacts
• reverse the loss of biodiversity
• ensure food security, nutrition and public health, making sure that everyone has access to sufficient, safe, nutritious, sustainable food
• preserve affordability of food while generating fairer economic returns, fostering competitiveness of the EU supply sector and promoting fair trade

See below for some videos and lesson plans to use in the class. 

2. Find out how much the class knows about this topic 

Possible questions to ask:

1. What is the objective of the Farm to Fork Strategy? 

Answer: The objective of the Farm to Fork Strategy is to ensure access to sufficient, nutritious, sustainable and healthy food to all Europeans at all times through the transition to sustainable food systems. 

2. How will food safety and public health be improved? 

Answer: Food safety and public health will be improved by updating the legislation in the fields of packaging, labelling, availability, traceability and pricing of food and fraud. 

3. What is the goal of raising consumer awareness in the food industry? 

Answer: The goal of raising consumer awareness is to enable them to make informed, healthy and sustainable food choices and to increase responsibility and opportunity for all actors in the food chain.

4. How will the shift to sustainable fish and seafood production be accelerated? 

Answer: The shift to sustainable fish and seafood production will be accelerated by bringing fish stocks to sustainable levels, strengthening fisheries management in the Mediterranean in cooperation with all coastal states, improving EU’s fisheries control system, and preventing illegal fish products from entering the EU market.

5. How will the transition to sustainable food systems be accelerated and facilitated? 

Answer: The transition to sustainable food system will be accelerated and facilitated with the participation of all stakeholders to maximise environmental, health and social benefits, ensure sustainable livelihoods for primary producers, reinforce EU's competitiveness at the global level, increase the resilience of food systems to disasters and any kind of emergencies, such as Covid-19 outbreak, and strengthen consumer protection. 

6. What is the objective for organic farming in the EU by 2030? 

Answer: The objective is to have at least 25% of the EU’s agricultural land under organic farming by 2030 and a significant increase in organic aquaculture. 

7. What sustainable practices will be promoted to ensure food safety? 

Answer: Sustainable practices such as reducing dependency on pesticides and antimicrobials, reducing excess fertilisation, increasing organic farming, improving animal welfare, and reversing biodiversity loss will be promoted to ensure food safety. 

8. What measures will be taken to ensure seed security and diversity? 

Answer: Measures will be taken to facilitate the registration of seed varieties, including for organic farming, and to ensure easier market access for traditional and locally-adapted varieties in order to ensure seed security and diversity. 

9. What new green business models will be promoted in the food industry? 

Answer: New green business models will be promoted to create new sources of income while protecting the environment through eco-friendly practices. 

10. What will be developed to ensure food supply and food security in times of crisis? 

Answer: A contingency plan for ensuring food supply and food security will be developed to be put in place in times of crisis.

3. Explain what the activity is about and formulate what you expect the students to do and learn 

Step 1. educate  

This activity is about expanding horizons. The students will learn what impact the strategy has on individual countries, where it is and at what stage, which country is ahead. How is the agriculture system of the given country? The aim is to make them realise that if we want to make a change, we need to know as much as possible about the given issue. 

Step 2. Implement

Organise a visit to the farm, or invite the farmer to the school for a discussion. The guest can be also someone from the ministry, policy maker, environmentalist, journalist from EU activ, …The aim is to to reach out and contact a specific person from practice and organise a discussion or online call. 

Step 3. Report

Create a report from the meeting, and  record the conversation, which can be then processed for other classmates. The recording can be used to make short videos with important messages and short explanations about the F2F strategy. The student will turn it into a series of videos/podcasts that will be available for his peers. 

4. Introduce students to information materials and resources to start the project

Resources for teachers:

EU Farm to Fork Strategy - youtube video about The EU Farm to Fork strategy for sustainable food. European food is famous for being safe, nutritious and of high quality. It should now also become the global standard for sustainability.

What challenges are faced by the Farm to Fork strategy? - youtube video. The Farm to Fork strategy requires a deep reconsideration of the role of agriculture and the heavy dependence on imports by EU security. It is not sure that a pure technological solution will be capable of resolving the modern predicament.

How to make a video on a farm visit - Film a Farm Pack allows teachers and children to develop an exciting project that combines farm visits with film making. The pack includes teaching guides and printable resources that take you through each stage as you plan, shoot and finally edit your farm-focused film. Lights, camera, action!

Farm to Fork Strategy (europa.eu) - EU website with the F2F strategy and all the related documents

“strategy farm to fork” – EURACTIV.com- search results of the keyword F2F strategy on Euractiv website

5. Research

• help students formulate research questions to find out more data about the issue 

Possible questions to ask:

1. How much do you know about F2F Strategy?

2. How important is it for you/households/country?

3. How can you contribute to fulfillment (to change)?

4. Do you want to be a part of the challenge?

• let students do the research: collect and analyse date, make evaluation and draw conclusions - students can compare conclusions between countries (SVK x CZ x AT) via Zoom
• you can take the class to an excursion to see real life application of the issue - visiting of national policy-makers (e. g. from the ministry of agriculture or an associations of farmers) the students can conduct short interview with them about actual implementation F2F Strategy on national level

6. Implementation

• First step is to invite guests, organise a discussion with them, research the topic, and create questions. They also need to make a promotion of the event before the discussion, e.g. create posters, …
• The discussion should be recorded and the video should be processed into a series of mini videos, at least 3. The videos should be then posted on social media and circulated around the school. 
• Ask students to compare and see at what stage is actually implementation of F2F Strategy on a national level in each partner country.  
• Gather the feedback from the peers. Maybe try to ask the same questions as at the beginning and compare the answers with the first round. 
• Give students enough time to work on the solutions 

7. Reflexion

after the implementation phase, discuss with students the outcome of the project, define some conclusions on how to further implement it  

• discuss with students the outcome of the project
  • What have we learned? 
  • What went well? What not? Why? What can we do to make it better next time?
  • How to implement outcomes in the following year - for next classes in school? 

Students can discuss if videos were helpful to increase awareness about this topic - how was their own awareness changed, they can use student´s peer assessment

8. Survey

Find out how much the class knows about this topic now – use Kahoot application - great idea - students can see differences between their knowledge before and after this activity (it will be necessary to save answers from first kahoot for comparison)

9. Presentation

ask the students to make presentation of the implemented project outcome  - students can prepare presentation after reflexion/discussion,  also try to invite policy makers for this event to school

• This could happen over an School Open Day or Parents Day
• Invite also municipality officials and policy makers to show them how your school is planning to reduce food waste