Food, Farming and Countryside Commission

💡Positive action is already happening across the UK – tune in to hear how farmers are leading the way.

🎧Listen now: ffcc.co.uk/conversation...

🌱For Ben, it all comes back to soil. Putting carbon back into the soil builds resilience and is good for the climate, good for the land, and – importantly – good for business.

☀️In the latest podcast episode, Will talks to @farmcarbontoolkit.bsky.social's Liz, and Ben, about how farmers can be part of the solution when it comes to reducing emissions and tackling climate change.

🗣️ “We have to put resilience into the business, and how do you do that? You have to put carbon into the soil.”

Listen to the full episode here: ffcc.co.uk/conversation...

Citizens, food and next steps Citizen Advisory Council publish new report, calling for fairness in the new Food Strategy.

👉Read report Laying the Foundation: ffcc.co.uk/news-and-pre...

🍂 This autumn, the Citizen Advisory Council will continue their work with Defra on the Food Strategy, visiting regions across the UK where food transformation is already happening, to see what’s already working – and how it can be replicated and scaled across different communities.

🍎 In Laying the Foundation, the Citizen Advisory Council sets out their Common-Sense Outcomes for the Food Strategy – a vision shaped by their lived experience of food, not the pursuit of profit.

🤔 What does a fair food system look like? And what should our leaders be looking to achieve when they make food policy?

Find out here: ffcc.co.uk/news-and-pre...

☀️ The great news? The same steps that help farmers adapt to these weather patterns extreme also cut emissions.

🎧 Tune in here: ffcc.co.uk/conversation...

💡 Net Zero has become a flashpoint for farming. But as Liz explains, when look at the subject through a resilience lens – like how to best proof soil against floods and droughts – the conversation becomes practical and rooted in everyday farming reality.

🌱 In this new episode of our farming podcast, Will Evans is joined by @farmcarbontoolkit.bsky.social's Liz Bowles and Ben Taylor-Davies to explore one of the biggest challenges – and opportunities – facing UK farming.

🎙️ Out now: We Need To Talk About… Net Zero

Listen to the episode in full: ffcc.co.uk/conversation...

💡New blog: Unlocking Pride

🏡 Last week, the government announced its new Pride of Place strategy – putting communities in the driving seat and committing more than £5bn to 250 places across England, Wales & Scotland.

🥕 How does food fit into all of this? Read the blog 👉 ffcc.co.uk/conversation...

🔗Click here to read more: ffcc.co.uk/conversation...

With the May 2026 election approaching, it’s time for leaders and decision-makers in Wales to start taking a joined up approach to food and farming – one that prioritises health, nature, climate and local, thriving economies that deliver for the people that live there.

As Jon says: “Turnover is vanity, profit is sanity. But even profit doesn’t tell the whole story. We need to ask: what kind of food system do we want for Wales? One that serves people, communities and the environment – not just one company’s bottom line."

With food and farming high on the agenda in Wales – from the Sustainable Farming Scheme to Senedd inquiries – FFCC Wales Director Jon Parker asks how we can better marry the government’s vision for the food sector with what citizens, farmers and future generations really need.

Rethinking Wales’ Food System FFCC Wales Director Jon Parker on why it’s time for a more holistic approach.

📝New blog: Rethinking Wales’ Food System

🔗Read the blog in full here: ffcc.co.uk/conversation...

Laying the Foundation A Food Strategy that works for everyone

👏 A huge thanks to everyone who came along and all the panellists that took part.

🔗 Find out more about how citizens are shaping the new Food Strategy in a new report from the Citizen Advisory Council here ffcc.co.uk/publications...

💰 The discussion also gave our CEO Sue Pritchard a chance to highlight the “huge investment in toxic narratives that try to persuade politicians that people don’t care about food” and the need for “investment that rebalances the power asymmetry between citizens and their concerns.”

🍎 Next up, we hosted a session with The Food Foundation & Sustain on Labour’s new Food Strategy.

🗣️ Daniel Zeichner MP and Citizen Advisory Council member, David Njoku, talked about the work citizens are doing as part of the Food Strategy and how government is listening.

👥 Hodmedod’s Josiah Meldrum added that profit in the food economy “doesn’t need to be extracted. It can be about connecting. It doesn’t need to be transactional. It can be relational. And we can use that, that approach, to really rethink about how the economy of food works.”

🌱 As Balcaskie Estate’s Toby Anstruther said, “that sense that we have some control over how we live and what the choices we make is really important… quality of life is critical and doesn’t have to be expensive, like freedom from litter and access to clean air.”

👀 There was talk of what the government is getting right, where more could be happening, and what the conditions for real change look like – particularly in light of the opportunities that the devolution agenda and the new Pride of Place strategy present.

💪 The discussion was excellent, focusing on how we can better support the connections that already exist within communities and places to give more power to the people that live there.

💡 Some highlights from our two sessions at Labour Party Conference yesterday…

🏡 We kicked things off with a breakfast panel at the BB Partners Lab on how building the real economy – better food, homes and communities – can help people live more meaningful, prosperous lives.

📝 A new report shows the value of involving citizens in policymaking!

It highlights real-life examples of how Food Ambassadors working with us and the @ffc-commission.bsky.social are making invaluable contributions to the government's new Food Strategy.

Learn more: ➡️ tinyurl.com/2e6um2b9

🗣 Today, CAC member David Njoku will join former Defra Minister Daniel Zeichner MP, Sustain’s Kath Dalmeny and The Food Foundation’s Anna Taylor at Labour Party Conference to discuss some of the report’s findings.

If you’re in Liverpool this morning, come along. 11-11:45 ECL Exhibition Event Hub.

🌱 It’s the culmination of the first phase of work observing government workshops and engaging with a wider group of citizens. In the next phase of work with Defra, the CAC will investigate what’s working well in different regions across the UK when it comes to food through a series of inquiries.

📚 Out today: Laying the Foundation

⚖️ In a new report from the Citizen Advisory Council (CAC), a group of citizens from across the UK call for fairness to sit at the heart of the new Food Strategy.

Read the news story + download the findings 👉 ffcc.co.uk/news-and-pre...