Background/Objectives

Climate change and other natural and human-made disasters are threatening food systems. These disruptions occur across the food supply chain, impacting farmers, producers, distributors, food system workers, consumers, and many others. Local governments in the United States have recognized that they are often key emergency food response actors in planning for future food system disruptions. Despite this recognition, there are limited resources available specifically for supporting local governments in building food system resilience. To help fill this resource gap, researchers at Johns Hopkins University partnered with representatives from five cities in the United States to (1) develop resources that could support local governments and help them build local food system resilience in a way that promotes equitable and just food systems, (2) evaluate the planning process and resources developed, and (3) support and learn from stakeholders in different stages in food system resilience planning and management about how others can better prepare for, respond to and recover from food system disruptions. This presentation will provide details on a food system resilience resource that was co-created by the city representatives and researchers and will explain how it can be used by local governments and their partners to develop and scale food system resilience strategies. The presentation will also highlight lessons learned about food system resilience in action from the city representatives and the evaluation findings.

Approach/Activities

The Food System Resilience Community of Practice (CoP) recruitment began in late 2019, and convenings took place in 2020. The CoP was composed of two to three representatives from Austin, TX; Baltimore, MD; Denver, CO; Morehead, MN, and Orlando, FL, as well as researchers from the Center for a Livable Future and Bloomberg Center for Government Excellence at Johns Hopkins University. The CoP consisted of six monthly 75-minute facilitated virtual sessions during which the group discussed key food system resilience planning elements: defining food system resilience, stakeholders, scoping and baseline assessments, hazard and vulnerability assessments, strategies for building food system resilience, goal setting, and implementation. After the initial set of calls, there was a two-part workshop that focused on key topics such as funding and communicating about resilience. Between the calls, the city representatives tested resources developed by the researchers. After the CoP, the group worked together for over a year to develop and further refine the resources. The researchers evaluated the CoP and the resources using surveys, interviews, and focus groups at several different time points.

Results/Lessons Learned

The final resources developed by the CoP are grouped together as a planning guide: “Food System Resilience: A Planning Guide for Local Governments” (https://tinyurl.com/resilience-planning-guide). The Planning Guide is structured as six modules containing information and tools about planning for food system resilience. The guide is action and strategies oriented with the goal of users walking away with a set of specific food system resilience strategies that can be used to form a standalone food system resilience plan or embedded into other plans or programs. The Planning Guide also has a key focus on equity, presenting a framework and tools for building an equity and justice-centered food system resilience planning process. Through the research evaluation elements of the project, we identified that many people do not feel that their jurisdictions are well prepared for food system disruptions, nor do they have sufficient resources to coordinate food system resilience work during disruptions. We identified that key food system resilience attributes (preparedness, diversity, redundancy, connectivity, capital reserves, flexibility, and equity) can help support short-term emergency response efforts and longer-term food system resilience planning. In addition to lessons learned from this work, the research evaluation also identified several key areas for future investment that could help to advance and scale resilience planning and implementation done by local governments and their partners.