Food

The Climate Action Stokesley and Villages group are working on promoting sustainable food through:

• asking local shops and restaurants to display their use of local produce
• working with local growers to reduce the use of pesticides
• supporting local cafes and restaurants to extend their offer of plant-based options
• sharing recipes
• sharing suppliers of sustainable and local food
• advertising local food related events

Sustainable food:
The promotion of food that has been sustainably produced with minimal detrimental effects on soil quality, water resources, natural habitat, biodiversity and the climate.

Cutting your diet’s carbon footprint

The BBC has a useful section on its website looking at how to cut the carbon footprint of your diet providing plenty of food for thought.

Food survey

Please complete our survey to help us build up a picture of dietary habits and wishes regarding plant-based food.

The food sub-group has held several meetings recently to look at how to increase the availability of sustainable food. Caroline and Noemi are part of the food sub-group and their goal is it to convince local restaurants and cafés to have (creative) plant-based dishes on their menus. In order to do so they are asking for your help.

“One of the reasons for this is the environmental aspect since plant-based food has been found to have a much lower CO₂ impact than meat or dairy products but it’s also about giving vegans the same opportunity as meat eaters to enjoy a good meal out and to socialise. Many restaurants here in the area have either no vegan dishes at all or often just a choice of one. It would be nice to see more balanced menus which are appealing to all their guests, no matter what dietary preferences they have. This would be particularly beneficial for couples or families where one party is a meat eater and the other a vegan.

We were therefore wondering how many people would be happy to order a vegan meal every now and then if it was available and interesting enough. If we have some numbers, we could communicate them to the local businesses which would be a good selling point.

We’re not trying to convert meat eaters into plant eaters, we’re primarily looking for more variety.”

Food and farming online discussion

In July 2020, Robert Campbell, a local farmer, provide input to start a conversation about food, farming and climate change. He provided a ‘thinkpiece’ in advance which led to questions to help frame the discussion. The ‘thinkpiece’, questions and summary of points that came up in the discussion can be found here.