An ambitious, 5-year plan to support local food producers, reduce waste, tackle food poverty, boost food growing and give all Brighton residents access to healthy and nutritious meals is being launched this month.
Led by Brighton and Hove Food Partnership and overseen by a panel of food experts, the updated Brighton and Hove Food Strategy Action Plan sets out how organisations will work together to create a ‘healthy, sustainable and fair food system’ for Brighton and Hove. Here’s how you can take action.
How we built the strategy
Launched in 2006, the city’s food strategy action plan is refreshed every 5 years. This latest plan was drawn up following extensive consultation, which saw around 250 experts and members of the public sharing their views and priorities. Along with the latest data and research, their feedback has been used to create actions that will have the biggest impact.
Why it matters
Only 36% of adults in the city eat five or more portions or fruit and vegetables a day, and almost one in three 11-year-olds are obese or overweight. These health impacts are more likely to be felt by people experiencing food insecurity. The number of people seeking emergency food support each week in the city has rocketed from 358 in 2018, to 6,300 in 2024. Meanwhile, a third of household waste in Brighton and Hove is food and drink.
Ali Ghanimi, Senior Manager of Brighton and Hove Food Partnership who led the food strategy refresh, said:
“The past five years have seen great shocks to our food system: the Covid-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine, the Cost-of-Living crisis and the UK’s second worse harvest on record. Our city has pulled together to rise to these challenges and keep people fed, but these shocks have highlighted just how fragile the global food system is. This plan builds on the city’s achievements while prioritising transformative actions that will make our food system more resilient and fair, working with residents, businesses, schools, food buyers and farmers.”
How to take action
Want to do something as a local resident, restaurant worker or business? We’ve highlighted the top things from the strategy that will make a difference:
Actions for residents:
- Reduce your meat and dairy consumption.
Try our vegan and plant based recipes - Cook more from scratch, use up your leftovers and perfect your portion sizes.
Challenge yourself with our tips for reducing food waste, from beginner to expert level. - Buy local, seasonal and Fairtrade food.
Browse our local, organic & ethical food stockist. - Reduce single use plastics and sign up to plasticfreepledge.com.
Read our helpful list of where to buy plastic free. - Compost your food waste at home or sign up to a community compost scheme.
Check out our community composting FAQ. - Swap sugary food and drinks for healthier alternatives.
Come to our Community Kitchen Classes and let our chefs inspire you.
Actions for restaurants and businesses:
- Flip the menu order to read vegetarian, fish, meat
- Buy seasonal and support the Sussex Six campaign
- Offer small portion sizes and ‘doggy bags’
- Evaluate your practices with the Sustainability Toolkit
- Reduce single use plastics and sign up to plasticfreepledge.com
- Support your local community food project
These are some suggestions, but we’d love to hear your ideas too. Email us at info@bhfood.org.uk
Initiatives already making a difference include:
- The ‘Taste Ed’ programme, piloted in early years settings is increasing children’s consumption of fresh fruit and vegetables.
- Primary school meals have reduced meat by 25% and introduced 2 portion sizes to reduce waste.
- Brighton & Hove Food Partnership’s Community Kitchen has provided more than 1,000 community cookery sessions for people in need
- The City Downland Estate Plan is encouraging regenerative farming practices to increase soil health and biodiversity, cut carbon emissions and food miles.
- The University of Brighton and Restaurants Brighton developed ‘The Restaurant Sustainability Toolkit’ to encourage food businesses to improve their environmental sustainability.
- There are now 55 community composting schemes serving 1,300 households, turning 187 tonnes of food waste into high quality compost for local food growing.
Now, more than ever, we must work together to achieve a more localised, equitable and resilient food system. One that is good for our health, our planet and our local economy.
Find out more about the many strands of our food strategy work
