Our work

Food is a common thread running through the country's hardest problems, from health, climate, nature, the cost of living right through to trust in whether anything can be made to work better.

Three of our most referenced pieces tell a vivid story.

The cost to the nation's health: £268bn is the annual cost of the UK's unhealthy food system, four times more than fixing it would cost.

The cost to national resilience: Two thirds the projected loss of high-quality farmland in England and Wales by 2050 without action on climate change; the Fens alone face a sixteen-fold increase in flood risk. FFCC’s report Farming for Change shows that a transition to agroecology could feed the nation, reduce emissions by 55-70% as well as dramatically improving biodiversity.

The cost to public trust: 69% of people across the UK say the government should do more to make food healthy. Just 7% think the system works well as it is.

Policy prescriptions are remarkably consistent. What's missing is a clear sense of how a country gets from policy intentions to real impact on people’s everyday lives; an honest account of what gets in the way; and the public mandate for taking on those difficult issues.

FFCC is changing this. We lead public involvement at national scale; rigorous, independent research and economic analysis that reframes debate, and work with place-based partnerships to help lead the change that people can see and feel.

Strategic priorities

What do people and businesses want from food?

Lesser heard voices must be at the table for a food and farming future that works for everyone. Meaningful engagement with farmers, progressive businesses and communities can help decision-makers spot the gaps in policy, find new and creative solutions, and help ensure people stay invested and receptive to the policies that ultimately affect them.

Our work focuses on deliberative public engagement at national scale, structured farmer dialogue, and convening for a different food economy – policy built with people, not just for them.

Explore our work amplifying voices

How to create real change in places around the UK?

What makes a place resilient? Often the barriers stand outside the usual food system boundaries – in decisions made locally, regionally and nationally.

Collaborating with partners in places, we will explore how we can create healthy, thriving and prosperous communities across the UK – and resource and share the practical, inspiring stories that show another way is possible. This means long-term partnerships with counties, councils, businesses and communities, working out what a fair transition really looks like where people live and work.

Explore our work in places

How does the political economy of food really work?

Every food system question – why healthy food costs more than it should, why farmers carry the risk while others take the margin, why land use decisions ignore the people who live with them – is, underneath, a question about rules and power. Who sets the incentives? Who bears the costs? Who is in the room?

Through rigorous, independent research and economic analysis, we reframe the debate around food systems, challenging the assumptions and barriers that limit progress. By interrogating the political and economic structures that shape our food systems, we identify the levers for transformative change to create a fairer, healthier and more sustainable food economy.

Explore our work on political economy

Our work so far

After two years of innovative and inclusive deliberation, our 2019 report, Our Future in the Land, set out a comprehensive agenda for that transition, backed by food, farming and green groups across the political spectrum. Unusually for a commission, we did not disband when we published. We stayed to help make it happen.

From 2020, when we became an independent organisation, our work focussed on gathering rigorous evidence on under-examined topics, convening seldom-heard voices, and connecting people and ideas that do not usually meet — farmers and economists, ministers and citizens.

Some stand-out pieces of work include:

Advocating for and piloting the Land Use Framework, published by government in 2026.
Running the the UK's largest-ever public dialogue on food in The Food Conversation. The Citizen Advisory Council now works with government on the Food Strategy.
Farming for Change, our modelling with IDDRI, which shows the UK can feed itself well through agroecological farming – an evidence base scepticism has yet to dislodge.

Learn more about us