Food systems in Europe and the UK are not delivering for people or the planet. Despite sustained efforts by many actors over several decades, as well as the opening of some political windows of opportunities in recent years (e.g. with the Farm2Fork strategy in the EU, or the UK government food strategy for England), progress has fallen short of what is needed.

This research for the Wellcome Trust led by the Food Systems Transformation Group in collaboration with TABLE, the Centre for Food Policy at City St George’s, Wageningen University (WUR) and IDDRI was designed to inform their future research funding strategy on food systems.

This webinar will share the main research results to identify how to make research funding more useful and effective in supporting a food system that is better for the climate, fairer and healthier. Based on an AI-assisted literature review, an extensive survey of over 80 ‘changemakers’ in Europe and the UK, and a series of stakeholder workshop, the study notably highlight two key points:

1. Changemakers have a fairly clear and convergent idea of what needs to change in the food system, and especially emphasized the importance of dietary shifts towards more fruits and vegetables, less animal source foods and less high fat, high sugar, high salt products. They however pointed out the need for further research and greater support from researchers to understand how to bring about such changes.
2. the importance of funding and carrying out research differently to

• enable food system stakeholders to contribute to frame the research that require more attention; and
• give greater prominence to disciplines and approaches that are currently not considered particularly ‘bankable’ in academic terms, such as public policy evaluation, political economy, or the analysis of business models supporting the transition.

The webinar is aimed at researchers, policy makers and research funders, and will be of interest to anyone interested in food systems transformations. It will be organized around three main parts:

1. an overview of the main results of the research, taking a comparative perspective;
2. a focus on three illustrative countries (Poland, Germany and the UK); and
3. a high-level panel bringing together representatives from the scientific community, research funders, and stakeholders actively engaged to bring about positive changes in food systems in terms of climate, equity and health outcomes.

The webinar will be held on 22nd October 2026 from 12:30 to 14:00 CET (11:30 to 13:00 BST).