New welfare perspectives for millions of meals in the Nordic Region

New Nordic initiative to find a common framework for food procurement in the public sector in the Nordic Region.

Last month a number of Nordic public food procurement and catering experts met at a workshop in Malmö. It quickly became clear to them that they could draw up a joint framework that would benefit national efforts for food supply and make use of the societal potential in organising the future of food procurement in new ways. This would give a completely new Nordic welfare perspective in this area.

It is a comprehensive area with huge potential. Each Nordic country serves between 800,000 and 1,000,000 meals in the public sector every day. It is a common challenge to find a sustainable and reasonable solution to this major task.

Emil Blauert describes public food supply as one of the previously most neglected welfare engines relating to Nordic food and food culture. He has great experience in Nordic food and was one of the initiators of the Malmö meeting on intelligent and sustainable public food procurement in the whole region.

Millions of meals every day

"In Finland alone there are many jobs in 22,000 public sector kitchens and 440 million meals a day for a daily margin of expenditure of 350 million euros for procurement of food and ingredients. In Denmark 800,000 public sector meals are served daily. We are facing an engine of change with regard to quality and health, and if we just tweek things a bit we can trigger major changes in society as well as more local jobs, healthier meals and a more sustainable consumption. The area covers public institutions, local authorities, government, yes, the Nordic Region and the EU."

"We all have the same challenge about how we structurally, economically and sustainably produce local ingredients and foods, prepare them at high quality and serve them. Every institution, every town and every local authority has the same working conditions and similar challenges, but we do not work together today in a structured way to share the best experiences with each other for the benefit of the different countries, but we can do so in the future. Several thousand people try to perform the same tasks and we need to find a sustainable model they can use, an inspiration they can draw on and a community they can benefit from", says Emil Blauert.

The mood at the workshop in Malmö was uplifting. The people there were competent and knew that they were both visionary and passionate at a Nordic level and wanted to take part in the challenge to identify best practice and efficiency without compromising on local ingredients and the many local jobs behind the public meals across borders.

Finland at the forefront

"Finland is a pioneer when it comes to preparing a sustainable national strategy for public procurement for public meals and purchasing. Finland is five or ten years ahead of the other countries, and this is because they have been extremely clever at organising the political process. This involves a broad policy that covers the social areas, business community, transport, health and education", says Emil Blauert, and goes on to say that Finland has found a greater cohesion in organising the tasks so that local food makes up at least 8% of public food spending, and 2% of the local authorities' budgets goes on public meals in Finland.

For example, the organisation Ekocentria with Hanna Husso as the driving force. There have also been some very interesting results in Copenhagen City Council with organic food led by the Copenhagen House of Food and with innovators like Betina Bergmann Madsen and Food and Meals", says Emil Blauert who collects good examples which others can learn from.

Based on this overall experience, the group proposes to the Nordic Council of Ministers' New Nordic Food programme to put public food procurement on the agenda and develop a programme that aims to work with public food procurement in the entire Nordic Region.

Nordic conference planned

Emil Blauert has been one of the driving forces behind New Nordic Food for several years and is now responsible for the programme Public Foodscapes which he sees as an umbrella for everyone working with public meals, as a tool to create welfare changes. The new project is spreading more and more and will soon be able to present an overall strategy for public meals as an instrument for welfare with focus on quality, health and efficiency.

"Examples of sustainable and intelligent national procurement systems are to be found in Finland, Copenhagen and, for example, in the Municipality of Klippan in Sweden, which highlights its initiatives, that are fortunately appreciated in the annual White Guide. These are initiatives from which others can learn a lot. I have already received a number of recommendations from the delegates at the Malmö meeting and proposals for workshops. Together we must transfer the best solutions to the respective local areas and in this way benefit the whole Nordic Region. We must find a way to initiate national and local development around local quality food industries, health and cohesion in a joint Nordic initiative", says Emil Blauert, who also said that the meeting in Malmö will be followed up by a Nordic conference in Helsinki in the autumn of 2014.

Read more:
Workshop ”Smart och hållbar upphandling inom offentliga kök i Norden”, 23-24.1.2014, Malmö, Sweden
Livsmedelsakademin, www.livsmedelsakademin.se 
Smaka på Skåne, www.smakapaskane.se 
Madkulturen, www.madkulturen.dk     

Photo: norden.org