Working party

Acton Allotments, Michael Wale

Cafe Spice Namaste, Cyrus Todiwala

Camden Council, Strategic Procurement, Nicole Fletcher

City University, Martin Caraher

Community Food Enterprise (CFE), Eric Samuel

Countryside Agency, Colin Pritchard

Faith and Food, Simon Cohen

Farmer and National Farmers Union member (NFU), Val Jones

Food Writer, Jenny Linford

Government Office for London (GOL), Kiran Grover (Hester Tidcombe covering)

Govt. Office for the South East (GOSE), David Pryce-Jones

Greater London Authority, Niall Machin

Greenwich Co-operative Development Agency (GCDA), Claire Pritchard

Grub Street Publishing, Anne Dolamore [chair of LFL]

London Development Agency (LDA), Mark Ainsbury/George Raszka/Alice Elliott

London Metropolitan University, Simon Doff

Newham Food Access Partnership, Sarah Williams

Regional Public Health Group, Elizabeth Dunsford

Simon Cohen is director of global tolerance, an award winning consultancy, productions and training company based in London. Part of global tolerance is faithandfood.com, which was launched in the House of Commons with an interfaith lunch for 100 religious leaders. Faithandfood.com contains Faith and Food Fact Files, written by leading members of each religion, which describe the main dietary practices and beliefs of the nine major religions in the UK. There is also a searchable database of London restaurants where people of different faiths can eat – together. Faithandfood.com promotes interfaith eating and a creative means for restaurants to expand their customer base, using faithandfood.com’s unique faith labeling system.]

Cyrus Todiwala

Cyrus Todiwala is Proprietor and Executive Chef of the Café Spice Namasté restaurant group (Cafe Spice Namaste & The Parsee), renowned for its innovative and fresh approach to Indian cuisine.
Born and brought up in Bombay, India, he graduated from Bombay’s Catering College and trained as a chef with the famous Taj Group in India. He left India for Europe in 1991, where he developed his hallmark style of blending traditional Indian culinary techniques and flavours with more unexpected ingredients.
A keen environmentalist, Cyrus cooks with organic products wherever possible, and has diligently worked to improve the environmental performance of his restaurants in terms of waste management and resource efficiency.
Cyrus was instrumental in setting up the Asian and Oriental School of Catering in Hoxton, including Zen Satori, a highly successful Asian and Oriental restaurant that provides onsite training for all students. He is committed to training initiatives that meet the needs of ethnic minority groups
Cyrus advised the Government on their NHS Better Food Programme.
In 2000, Cyrus was awarded an MBE in recognition of his extensive knowledge, skill, commitment and expertise to the restaurant and catering industry.

Jenny Linford has worked as a freelance food writer since 1991, with work ranging from cookbooks and recipe-editing to newspaper articles and restaurant reviews. Her passion and special area of knowledge is London’s food scene and she is the author of Food Lovers’ London (Metro Publications), a multi-cultural guide to London’s food shops and restaurants, currently in its fifth edition, which she researches herself. She has a regular monthly slot on BBC London Radio discussing London’s gastronomy, from farmers’ markets to Thai supermarkets, with broadcaster Robert Elms. As a member of the Guild of Food Writers’ Committee (2001-2005) she worked actively on the Guild’s Cook It campaign, to promote the joys of cooking to children. Over two years ago, Jenny became involved in the campaign to save Newham’s Queens Market from insensitive council development, publicising the market’s plight in Time Out and on BBC London Radio.]

Kiran has been working on Food Policy in the Sustainable Development Unit at Government Office London (GOL) since September 2004, where she is engaged through partnership work, to develop a more sustainable food agenda in London.
Kiran works in partnership with the LDA Food Unit to support the work of the Mayor’s London Food Board, London Food and its subsidiary groups. They are currently working to publish the Mayor’s London Food Strategy in May 2006. She is also working on the Public Sector Food Procurement Initiative in London (PSFPI).
Kiran keeps a watching brief on farming issues, liaising with GOSE who look after London’s rural agenda. She represents GOL at various meetings including the South East Rural Affairs Forum, Rural Urban Fringe, PSFPI Regional Contacts and Sustainable Farming and Food Regional coordinators.
Prior to this, Kiran has worked in Whitehall for over five years at ODPM, DCMS and the Home Office. She has a Masters Degree in History of Art and Archaeology from SOAS, University of London.]

Anne Dolamore (Also Chair of Sustain. and Sustainable Food Chains working parties)

Anne is a past Chair of the Guild of Food Writers and is a member of the International Association of Culinary Professionals. She is the publisher at Grub Street Publishing which specialises in cookery, especially health, childrens’ food and allergy-related topics. Anne has also taken a keen interest in the development of the market for local foods, organic foods and is deeply concerned about the potential negative impact of GM crops.]

Simon Doff has an MSc in Food Safety & Control and is a qualified teacher. He worked for McDonalds and BHS before specialising in the fine food sector. Simon has run a delicatessen, set up and managed a wholesale business supplying London hotels and been managing director of a biscuit manufacturer.
For the past 6 years, Simon has run university-based advisory services for SME food manufacturers, delivering consultancy, training and mentoring programmes for owner/managers in the areas of food hygiene, food safety, quality management, production management and new product development.]

I recently joined East Thames as Strategic Manager of the Newham Food Access Partnership (NFAP). Prior to this I had developed and managed community projects at Groundwork East London, an environmental regeneration charity.
NFAP’s work focuses on promoting and addressing long-term, strategic issues affecting food access in the Borough, and a strategy has been developed to guide this work. In addition to the focus on a healthy diet our remit has widened to include issues such as ethical and local sourcing and promoting growing projects.
Partners include LB Newham, Newham PCT, Community Food Enterprise, Aston Mansfield and East Thames.
Priorities for the year include working towards making Newham a Fair Trade borough, getting our strategy adopted by Council and PCT, work with small retailers and regeneration projects to develop their role in solutions to food access, and promoting healthy diet in the workplace.
NFAP also has a continuing role in supporting local interventions being delivered by community organisations, such as Community Food Enterprise.]