Food Systems Summit Compendium

Chapter 2

Key Inputs from Summit Workstreams

LEVERS OF CHANGE

Four Levers of Change have been identified, that cut across the different Action Tracks: Human Rights; Innovation; Finance; and Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment. Youth empowerment is also a top priority of the Summit, incorporated at all levels of the Summit content and process. Young people are represented as Vice-Chairs in all 5 Action Tracks, working together with the youth champions and food systems heroes. On multiple continents, self-organised youth constituencies led by young champions are actively engaging in all Action Track debates. Through regional fora and a variety of advocacy, social, educational activities, they will ensure in the lead-up to and during the Summit, that young people have a strong voice in shaping sustainable food systems for their future.

The levers of change are relevant across the full range of the SDGs and are critical for ensuring that different food systems become sustainable in the coming decade. The communities engaged in the levers will identify key issues that deserve attention within Summit dialogues and action tracks.

  • Human Rights: The Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food has joined the Food Systems Summit process to help ensure that human rights and law play a central role in the Summit. The Special Rapporteur help bring a systematic understanding of the policy instruments, legal frameworks, resolutions, and treaties that already exist to focus on action and implementation, building upon the strong foundations of multilateralism and rights that already exist.  Refer to the attached preface by the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to food, Michael Fakhri.
  • The Finance community work with Action Tracks on areas including assessing investment need, incentives, solutions that address inclusion, and risk. Its objectives across all Action Tracks are to leverage substantial resources, look into ways to derisking innovations and accelerating change, and mobilizing private capital, including from financial institutions, business and consumers. It further identified specific questions and issues to be brought into discussions for each AT, and especially, considered when shaping solutions.
  • The Innovation community will bring together public, private, social sector innovation partners in a commitment to make innovation a significant enabling factor for food systems transformation both in the lead into the Summit and in alignment with the 2030 Agenda and all 17 SDGs. It has identified a twin track approach to support specific action tracks and game changer initiatives, and support a cross-cutting innovation agenda across business model, scientific, technological and social innovation. Emerging areas of focus include data and digital, scientific and technological, national and regional innovation ecosystems as well as societal and institutional innovation models, including traditional and indigenous knowledge.
  • The Gender community identified seven prominent issues, to elevate gender equality women’s empowerment as well as the engagement of women across all action tracks: Women’s rights to land; economic empowerment of women in food systems; unpaid care and agricultural labor burden; women’s leadership in food systems; access to technologies (including digital); changing norms and addressing institutional barriers; gender responsive agricultural and food systems policies.

Cross-cutting levers of change create multi-stakeholder support communities and develop discussion starter papers. Focal points are nominated amongst the core-teams of each Action Track.

Policy Briefs from Levers of Change

For each Levers of Change a policy brief has been published, in addition to one on Governance.

  1. Human Rights Lever of Change: Unlocking the transformative potential of a human rights-based approach
  2. Food Finance Architecture: Financing a Sustainable, Nutritious Food System
  3. Innovation Lever of Change, Policy Brief
  4. Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment: A Prerequisite for Food Systems Transformation
  5. Policy Brief –  Governance of Food Systems Transformation