Minutes of the London Food Access Forum
Sustain, 94 White Lion St, N1 9PF
18th December 2006
Present
Louise Beckingsale (A Moveable Feast – Healthy Living Centre), Laura Davies, Simon Doff (London Metropolitan University), Janita Golding Richards (Camden PCT)
Anna Kitt (Kensington & Chelsea PCT), Rebecca Mann (Manor Gardens), Kelly Morris (Kensington & Chelsea PCT), Ben Reynolds (Sustain), Angela Rowan (London Borough of Richmond-Upon-Thames), Laura Willoughby (The Food Chain) and Lisa Wilson (Sustain)
Apologies
Tom Beeston, Claire Pritchard, Eric Samuels, Sarah Williams
1. Presentation and discussion on Evaluation techniques by Laura Davies
Laura gave us a background to how she had become an evaluator. After starting life as a farmer and then working on the Sandwell food co-op, she moved into evaluation and is currently the evaluator of Food and Wellbeing: the nutrition strategy for Wales. The presentation is attached to the notes and will shortly be available on www.sustainweb.org along with the presentations from previous meetings.
This was followed by questions from attendees.
Laura W: How much should be built in to budgets for evaluation
Laura D: 10%. There needs to be a strong evaluated method if the project is going to be rolled out from pilot.
Lisa W: What about evaluating yourself if you don’t have the money. How to avoid the trappings of bias.
Laura D Go back to the original objectives and run interviews – ask the right questions.
Have we met or partially met the objectives? Here’s how we’ve done it. Questionnaires, run a workshop as part of existing meeting, interviews with staff, partners, beneficiaries. Be as opportunistic as possible, it’s hard to be systematic. Have to justify the sample, and why it’s giving you a reliable survey.
The commonest thing Laura D. comes up against is that it’s impossible to attribute that the outcome is due to the action/programme e.g. if someone becomes healthier is it just down to the new food co-op or a range of factors?
For further reading Laura D. recommended Ray Pawson – Evidence-based Policy
2. Discussion on future
Ben Reynolds presented a paper on options for the future of the group. These broadly fell into 3 categories a. remain in current format, b. seek voluntary help to extend support we can provide, c. seek funding for coordinator of forum who can also assist the London initiatives (See attached ‘future paper’ for more information).
Those present were keen to carry the forum on in its current state (option a) at a minimum. They find it a useful forum, and that there is no where else to get this information.
Within option c, one of the potential choices posed was to have a funded ‘roaming officer’, based in the different projects for a fixed period. This was opposed as it was felt it might tie that officer down, and that they wouldn’t be that much help.
The preferred option was to have an officer that would see the whole picture of food access work across London. Some of the roles suggested were as follows:
- Visit the projects regularly, to collate and share best practice.
- Advocacy on behalf of the small projects
- Identifying parternships/match-making
- Identifying funding streams which are useful for the projects
- In addition, the forum could recommend certain pieces of work for them to focus on when appropriate e.g. How to set up the perfect community café. Produce short reports on best practice on different food access themes.
Another role that was suggested was that they could co-ordinate a London Food awards, although when clarified this could mean a one off award for good practice, or a standard that an organisation can attain e.g. Soil Association mark. Ben R. suggested that this was a role for the Mayoral London Food Board, as it is suggested in the strategy, alternatively we could approach them for funding to run this, however it would extend beyond food access, so may not be central to this group. Other suggested roles i.e. work on food mapping, planning and regeneration, were agreed to be beyond the abilities of one officer.
It was agreed that the future document would be circulated for feedback from those not present, and specifically that a wishlist of roles could be drawn up for the proposed officer. Sustain will then circulate the collated feedback for discussion at the next forum.
In the meantime, Sustain will look for a volunteer in January in order to pilot the post on a small scale.
Registered charity (no.