Advancing Healthy and Sustainable Public Food Procurement in Europe
On 2 December, during a week of major European food systems events in Copenhagen, we convened a CLEVERFOOD Policy Roundtable on Healthy and Sustainable Public Food Procurement.
About the Roundtable
Taking advantage of the presence of so many brilliant and passionate minds at the FOOD2030 networks conference and the Danish presidency conference on Transformative Governance for Food Systems and Biodiversity, we organised a CLEVERFOOD Policy Roundtable on Healthy and Sustainable Public Food Procurement.
Jasmina van Driel together with Dr. Martin Krayer von Krauss and Juliane Gleitze co-hosted an interactive evening discussion with 20 stakeholders from health, food systems, advocacy, science, and city administrations.
Participants ranged from local governments to EU-level bodies and civil society organisations.
Our catering partner VegAnna fuelled the discussion with fully vegan meals and contributed grounded insights from the catering and procurement front line.
Building on a Strong Foundation
We were not starting from scratch. We are humbly building on the amazing work started by ICLEI and 8 other NGOs in 2022, with the Buy Better Food Campaign and Manifesto. And on the remarkable work of the JRC, which recently published its landmark report on Criteria for Sustainable Public Procurement for food, food services and vending machines.
There is enormous potential for using public procurement of food as a lever for transitioning to a healthy, sustainable and more equitable Europe. A JRC report from 2024 indicates that about € 50,000,000,000,000 is spent on food procurement in the EU. Imagine if this would be used for tasty, healthy, sustainable, equitable and truly nourishing food – in schools, in vocational and theoretical education institutes, in government, in all public places where people eat food.
And with the EAT Lancet Planetary Health Diet we truly hold gold in our hands. This reference diet can be used for shaping the criteria for public procurement. No need to reinvent the wheel.
Momentum is Now - Join the Call to Action
One clear result of the roundtable was a shared intention to coordinate input and mobilise networks for the European Commission’s open public consultation on the revision of the EU Public Procurement Directive (2014/24/EU).
Political momentum is now. Science is clear. Healthy and sustainable food is good for people and planet.
Our call to action: fill in the consultation survey that is open until 26th of January 2026. And spread the word.