Independent evaluation shows impact of London food partnerships on addressing food insecurity

ICF have completed an independent evaluation of the GLA-funded Food Roots 2 programme, showing that food partnerships can be an effective way to tackle food insecurity. Findings suggest well-supported local partnerships can deliver tangible community impact and provide a basis for sustainable, preventative approaches to food insecurity.

There are now over 100 food partnerships across the UK which are members of the Sustainable Food Places network, with many more emerging food alliances developing. 

Food Roots 2

The Food Roots 2 programme took place between 2023-25. It was designed by the Greater London Authority (GLA) to respond to the growing issue of food insecurity and increased demand for emergency food aid in London, building on the original Food Roots Incubator programme.

The second round of the Food Roots programme provided a total of £1.26 million in grant funding to 21 food partnerships across London, providing funding for both coordinator time and partnership activity focussed on strategic work to address food insecurity across the capital.

The Food Roots programme had four key objectives:

• Increase the number of charitable food providers offering cash-first advice and support services, thereby expanding the range of financial resilience building services available to food-insecure individuals beyond emergency food provision, and helping Londonders to maximise their incomes.
• Enhance awareness and visibility of the Healthy Start programme among food partnerships and service users, facilitating improved access to vital support services and promoting collaboration between statutory and voluntary sectors.
• Strengthen relationships within the voluntary and community sector (VCS) and between local authorities and community food providers, fostering strategic alliances and facilitating the development of sustainable solutions to address spikes in demand for emergency food aid and support.
• Improve partnerships' ability to access sustainable external funding, ensuring the continuity and growth of initiatives beyond the grant period and enabling a more resilient response to food insecurity challenges.

The support programme

Alongside the provision of grant funding to food partnerships, a learning and support programme was provided by TSIC, Sustain, Food Matters and First Love Foundation. The learning curriculum was co-designed with the partnerships to address immediate priorities such as governance, partnership development, fundraising, and wraparound support, and included workshops, site visits, online and in-person learning, and one-to-one support. Later, content was adapted for ‘beginner’ partnerships needing foundational skills and ‘mature’ partnerships ready for strategic development, making the training relevant to participants at different stages. Partnerships reported highly valuing the chance to network with and learn from other coordinators doing similar work to them in other boroughs, and particularly getting together in person through site visits to other projects.

First Love Foundation provided tailored mentoring to some of the grantees that were in a position to progress their provision of advice and support services. Civil Society Consulting also provided mentoring to organisations to support long-term fundraising.

Citizen's Advice delivered Healthy Start training to frontline staff across London, helping to increase awareness of the scheme.

Evaluation findings

Developing and strengthening relationships: 

Food Roots funding helped to develop or re-establish partnerships, allowing time to build trusted relationships, foster inclusive membership and collaborative working between multiple partners, co-design strategies, and offered partners crucial space to look beyond 'fire fighting' and think about longer term strategies to reduce food insecurity. In most areas, much of this work was still at an early stage by the programme’s end with sustainability plans being explored.

Offering holistic support beyond food aid: 

Partnerships were encouraged and supported to develop 'wraparound support' offering income maxmising advice and wellbeing services alongside charitable food provision. Partners took varies approaches to this and many saw progress. These efforts marked a shift towards preventative, holistic support, but challenges remain around data sharing, resources, and consistent use of digital systems.

Accessing sustainable external funding:

Several partnerships were supported to bolster their governance structures, grant management processes, and improve their capacity to secure long-term funding. Some also explored income generation activities. However, partnerships faced challenges in capturing and evidencing their collective work due to limited evaluation capacity, inconsistent reporting, technological barriers, and data privacy concerns.

Increasing awareness and visibility of Healthy Start: 

The training helped to increase awareness and understanding of the scheme among frontline staff and volunteers, and several partnerships included Healthy Start promotion within their activities, using diverse methods to improve uptake and overcome barriers. Despite local promotion efforts, wider issues with the scheme create barriers to uptake which local efforts alone could not overcome.

Recommendations

The evaluators produced a set of recommendations for food partnerships, funders and other key actors:

Recommendations for new food partnerships

• Establish a clear purpose and shared vision with simple governance arrangements.
• Secure dedicated coordination capacity from the start, ideally shared across roles.
• Build credibility early with quick wins and map existing services to avoid duplication.

Recommendations for emerging food partnerships

• Show tangible added value, such as pooled resources and reduced duplication, to encourage engagement.
• Align with council strategies while keeping community-led approaches.
• Invest in visibility and trust-building through meetings, visits, and regular communications.

Recommendations for established food partnerships

• Review membership regularly to maintain relevance and effectiveness.
• Diversify funding and hosting models to reduce dependence on short-term grants.
• Support staff and volunteer wellbeing, providing time for reflection and peer support.
• Adapt the model continuously to fit local context, needs, and opportunities.

Recommendations for funders

• Establish a clear purpose and shared vision, codified in simple governance arrangements.
• Invest in long-term coordination capacity (ideally five years+) to sustain partnerships and institutional memory.
• Support cross-borough collaboration through modest, strategic investment in networks like the London Sustainable Food Places (SFP) Network.
• Fund organisational development for smaller community organisations to strengthen governance, systems, and workforce capacity.
• Resource evaluation and monitoring to capture impact, guide investment, and support evidence-based approaches.
• Fund for strategy as well as delivery, enabling reflection, planning, and innovation beyond immediate crisis response.

Recommendations for local, regional and national actors

• Embed food insecurity into broader policy agendas (health, poverty, housing, climate) to address structural causes.
• Enable cross-borough coordination and shared guidance and promote cash-first and preventative approaches as standard practice.
• At the national level, address root causes of food insecurity, provide permanent crisis support funding, and issue clear frameworks to guide local action.

Recommendations for future programme design

• Plan for longer timescales to allow systemic and cultural change.
• Design flexible delivery models to accommodate local differences in capacity, infrastructure, and political context.
• Prioritise cultural change through training, facilitation, and leadership development.
• Build in succession planning to sustain progress despite staff turnover, using legacy toolkits, peer mentoring, and shared documentation.

Next steps

A key challenge of Food Roots 2 was that the programme wasn't long enough for partnerships to fully establish as sustainable models, and in some cases, partnerships have lost their coordinators. The evaluators note that while real systemic change was not possible in the timeframe, the programme has helped reframe food insecurity and demonstrated the value of moving beyond short-term emergency food provision by integrating advice services, testing cash-first approaches, and linking food aid to wider support networks.

This evaluation adds to the strong evidence base of the effectiveness of food partnerships and the need to continue funding food partnerships as vital infrastructure to address food systems issues including food insecurity. The Crisis and Resilience Fund may offer local authorities the opportunity to continue some of the progress made on strategic work to reduce food insecurity, increase wraparound support services, and bolster financial resilience of Londoners.

Read the full report