National food system reporting: ‘Seeing’ Australia’s future food system
Key points
- Australians have growing aspirations for our food system – we want to be able to meet sustainability, health and social inclusion goals alongside economic goals
- A problem is we can’t ‘see’ these goals to progress towards them, because current approaches to analysing and reporting on Australia’s food system have evolved to focus on economic goals
- Food System Horizons has published the report from a national food system dialogue where 70 of Australia’s food system leaders laid out the narratives they want to be able tell about Australia’s food system, and what it should look like into the future
- The evidence required to validate and communicate these narratives is a strong demand signal to national institutions regarding the types of food system analysis we need
- Australia’s food system leaders want national reporting that:
- recognises a broader set of food system participants and contributions
- reveals where the food system is failing vulnerable groups
- supports and common understanding of what our future food system should look like, and
- evaluates more holistic approaches to food system governance.
- Through Food System Horizons, CSIRO and The University of Queensland will use this report to convene discussions with public sector reporting agencies about the data and analysis that should be provided in response to the demand expressed by food system leaders.
Why do more holistic food systems reporting?
We provide evidence from Australia’s food system leaders that more holistic analysis and reporting is needed across Australia’s food system. Current systems for collecting, analysing and reporting on Australia’s food system have been designed to meet sector-specific economic goals. Reporting to meet economic goals remains vital, but now needs be expanded to report on broader sustainability, health and social inclusion goals. One way to capture the demand for more holistic food reporting is to gather the narratives that food system leaders want to share about Australia’s food system and what it should look like into the future. The evidence needed to validate and communicate these narratives provides reporting agencies with a strong demand signal for the types of data and analysis needed.
What do we want from a national reporting system?
The narratives shared by food system leaders revealed five themes that they want to share about Australia’s food system and what it should look like into the future:
- The unusual suspects: Recognising the different actors in the food system
- No more surprise chains: Seeing the arrows, not just the boxes
- Gross domestic food happiness? Creating a common language
- Valuable stories: Nurturing emerging narratives based on shared values
- A Minister for Food? Governance options for the food system
These themes are demand signals for future national food system reporting. In general, food system leaders want to augment reporting on economic goals, and begin reporting more deeply on sustainability, health and social inclusion goals. They think that an important first step toward doing this is for national food reporting systems to recognise a broader set of participants across Australia’s food system. They want reporting systems that can assess the ways in which the food system is suspected of failing vulnerable groups, and that help to reveal options for addressing these failures. They want foresighting mechanisms that create a common language for understanding and reconciling views about what Australia’s future food system should look like. They also want an evidence base for evaluating new and more holistic approaches to food system governance, such as the creation of government food portfolios.
What next?
Through Food System Horizons, CSIRO and The University of Queensland will use build on these findings to convene further discussions with public sector reporting agencies about the data and analysis we should collectively be providing in response to the demand expressed by food system leaders.