How a shipping container in Yorkshire is helping transform healthy food

Greens grown here without soil under artificial lights are proving a big hit with customers as part of the FixOurFood programme.

The urban vertical farm harnesses the eco-friendly approach using little water or nutrients to grow salad crops including pea shoots, watercress and herbs all year round.

Grow It York is both a commercial operation and a research facility for FixOurFood which is looking at the health, environmental and economic challenges of how food is grown, supplied and consumed.

The climate emergency means farmers will have to adapt to new ways of production to ease pressure on the environment linked to decades of intensive agricultural practices.

Meanwhile, food-related ill health remains a pressing problem, putting increased demands on an already over-stretched NHS.

The programme, being led by experts at York University, aims to improve the food production system from fields, through procurement, and right onto the plate.

One of its key areas involves looking at how food is produced and examining a switch away from traditional farming practices focused on high yields and high inputs from fertilisers and pesticides, causing significant environmental harm.

Instead, the programme is investigating less intensive farming using techniques which regenerate the environment and, importantly, are backed by market incentives from supply chains including supermarkets and food processors and government funding.

This aims to address the historic decline in soil quality and fertility, improve water quality and biodiversity, and reduce carbon gas emissions.

The programme is working with farmers already exploring the approach, as well as experts at Leeds University’s farm close to the A1 in North Yorkshire where a series of plot trials are underway to test the impact of regenerative farming practices in the hope learning can be scaled up nationally.

Prof Bob Doherty, academic director of FixOurFood, said: “You can’t keep degrading soil health and biodiversity and damaging water courses – it’s just not sustainable.

“The food system should have a positive impact on human health and planetary health, not the other way round.”

Alternative hybrid business models are also being examined including cooperatives, food hubs and community farms like Grow It York. These can focus on pursuing sufficient rather than maximum profits and accepting smaller returns in the short term to build resilience in the supply chain.

Part of making the food system more sustainable also involves growing and selling more produce in local markets.

FixOurFood commission chair David Kerfoot said public procurement was a key area of focus to help small and medium-sized businesses get a foothold in local contracts currently in the stranglehold of multi-nationals.

“I am determined that we get some things out there on the ground where it matters,” he said.

“For example, could we get a pilot project in Yorkshire where local food producers supply 20 or 30 schools across an area and we consolidate all those food products and deliver them out?

“Because it’s absolutely ridiculous that we have major egg producers in North Yorkshire and public institutions are getting their eggs from Milton Keynes.

“Successive governments have proclaimed a policy where local place is really important but they’re not supporting the local carrot producer or the local dairy producer to get into the public procurement process.

“I would ask them to look at that arena very, very closely.”

New national regulations stipulating 50 per cent of publicly procured food has to be locally sourced or certified as having been produced to higher environmental standards are expected to assist smaller businesses although their impact is yet to be tested.

But, as Prof Doherty notes, food also needs to be healthy.

He said: “Everybody talks about us needing more doctors and more nurses but nobody’s talking about why we have people who are more sick. It’s not just about an ageing population, it’s also about dietary ill health and the sooner we wake up to that the better.”

FixOurFood is in particular calling for mandatory national standards for school dinners including provision of more vegetable and fruit options.

FixOurFood commissioner and dietician Paul Davison, who works in Bradford Council’s children and families living well service, said poor nutrition disproportionately affected children from more deprived backgrounds, reducing their growth, increasing levels of obesity and worsening dental health.

Tooth decay is the leading cause of hospital admissions among five to nine-year-olds in England and responsible for a quarter of missed school days.

Latest figures show Yorkshire has the highest rate of hospital tooth extractions among children, some 70 per cent above the national average.

But the programme has compiled compelling evidence many children are not being helped to eat healthy meals at school.

School menus too often do not offer nutritious options, while youngsters eligible for free school meals have their choice further reduced due to the meagre allowance of £2.53 on average per meal in secondary schools.

Mr Davison said school food should “look and taste delicious” and give youngsters the energy and nutrients they needed to get the most from their school day.

Research showed some children in the UK were not getting enough of key nutrients including calcium, zinc and iron. A good school meal should include healthy sources of these such as milk, wholemeal bread and beans.

But the benefits of school dinners went beyond preventing children going hungry during the school day.

“Through exposing children to both new and familiar foods, school dinners can help to bring to life the nutritional content covered in the curriculum, contributing to good food literacy, with a curiosity about the social and environmental aspects of food and eating,” he said.

“The school dining experience can help with establishing routines, build fine motor skills and provides children with an opportunity to boost social and emotional skills as they sit down with friends to enjoy their meals around a table.”

He said the threshold to qualify for free school meals was also low. This left low-income families who were experiencing food poverty missing out on opportunities for children to access warm and nourishing meals at school. Meanwhile, schools were also facing difficulties providing balanced and nutritional meals for less.

“There are many school catering teams who are passionate about providing nutritious and satisfying meals to the children they serve although they are limited in their flexibility to adapt school food, for example through the cost of additional ingredients which staff may use to improve the appeal of vegetables or bean-based recipes,” he said.

The FixOurFood programme is aiming to help primary schools in the region provide healthy schools to children created from fresh, sustainable and locally sourced produce.

Prof Doherty added: “I hope that going forward, we’ll get some recognition that food is very much linked to learning and attainment and the health of these young people.

“They develop their food habits in that age range very early on so I think it’s a very important intervention.”