Copy These! 5 Big Local Ideas About Creating A Food Partnership

Good Food Oxfordshire is the sustainable food places partnership for Oxfordshire.

1. Engagement is the food of collaboration. 

A food partnership can comprise dozens of different stakeholder groups. The success of the partnership relies on each member organisation remaining actively engaged, and in the sharing of responsibilities.  

“Our job at Good Food Oxfordshire is not to do everything for everyone but to facilitate and advocate the great work that our member organisations are doing. Keeping all the organisations engaged and adding value is ultimately more powerful than doing it on your own. We share good practice and challenges to inspire and inform, raise awareness at policy level, amplify small voices and share needs and information.”  

Read more about Good Food Oxfordshire. 

2. Different plates for different places. 

Whilst the concept of a food partnership is one that can be implemented in any local area, the actual structure and activities of the partnership will vary enormously from place to place, depending on the size and demographics of the population, whether it’s rural or urban and whereabouts in the country it is. In a the Carbon Copy Podcast episode Create A Food Partnership we spoke to representatives from partnerships in two very different places – the city of Aberdeen in North East Scotland, and Carmarthenshire, a rural county in South West Wales. 

Listen now to hear what being in a food partnership means in these places. 

3. There’s a tried and tested recipe for success. 

The Sustainable Food Places (SFP) programme has been around for over a decade now, and there are currently 120 communities across the UK with a food partnership. If there isn’t a partnership near you, the SFP website has a useful toolkit to help you to get started –with guides for everything from stakeholder engagement to monitoring and evaluation. 

Discover the toolkit. 

4. Waste not… 

When different parts of the food system and wider community are connected through a food partnership, waste is easier to prevent. Organisations and individuals with a surplus of food can more easily get that food to those that can use it. In Oxfordshire, for example, the food partnership (made up of over 200 organisations including Oxford City Council, charities FareShare and SOFEA, farmers and growers and other food businesses) runs local food larders across the city of Oxford. These are open to all, as a place to source affordable food regardless of your circumstances. 

Read more about one of the larders. 

5. Put your policy where your mouth is. 

The UK Government is currently lagging behind the governments of Scotland and Wales when it comes to food policy. 

In Scotland, the Good Food Nation Act was passed in 2023, placing statutory duties on Scottish Government, local authorities, and Health Boards to produce systems-level Food Action Plans, each with inclusive and transparent consultation processes, overseen by an independent Food Commission. Read more on the Sustainable Food Places website. 

In Wales, the Well-being of Future Generations Act places food very much at the centre of its first strategy (Cymru Can); and the Future Generations Commissioner has since been working with Food Sense Wales, Public Service Boards and Public Bodies to integrate sustainable food policies into their well-being plans, with a particular emphasis on community food plans that foster change at a local level. Read more in this article from Food Sense Wales. 

It’s clear that more collaborative, connected and locally focused food strategy is good for everyone; so more work is needed to ensure that everyone in the UK is able to benefit. 

Create A Food Partnership is the latest focus in Carbon Copy’s 25 Big Local Actions in 2025 campaign. For more information about this and to discover a local action that’s right for you, visit our campaign landing page.