Sustainable Food & SSE Study: Fertile Links

By its transversal nature, the agroecological and food transition is at the crossroads of cultures and influences that the actors combine on a daily basis. In particular, the Social and Solidarity Economy (SSE), which allows us to think differently about agricultural sectors and value chains and offers a fertile framework for new alliances. This new study gives a voice to the actors in the field but also to those who support and finance them. Without claiming to be exhaustive, it explores the meeting points between the food value chain and the SSE, offers practical information to get started and identifies development paths.

New Modes of Action for Sustainable Food

We now know that another economy is possible and necessary. The transition to this “world after” economy is already underway, as evidenced by the many initiatives in the field of Sustainable Food. We have been committed for 10 years and are solicited by many players. By detecting and supporting these innovations through sponsorship and impact investing, we have seen major changes, in the light of citizens’ expectations and the rise of the social solidarity economy (SSE), which is particularly adapted to the agroecological and food transition.

Collaborations between the SSE and the agricultural/food world are still recent, even if in the field, projects combining these two influences have been consolidated for years. The arrival of new players, the hybridization and increasing complexity of our partners’ business models, but also, sometimes, a lack of knowledge of the tools, mechanisms and opportunities offered by the SSE, have led us to commission a study.

Understanding opportunities, identifying needs, sharing tools

Exploring the interfaces between Sustainable Food and SSE, this study, carried out by Florence Bardot, does not aim to make recommendations or denounce shortcomings, but to illustrate the richness of the approaches: why do Sustainable Food actors turn to the Social and Solidarity Economy? What trends do they perceive? What are the specific needs of agricultural and food projects that develop economic models and modes of cooperation under the SSE? What resources do they think are useful?

Supported by interviews with some twenty actors in the field, heads of networks and financiers, this study provides an overview of the issues and needs, highlights exemplary initiatives and provides practical resources that we hope will be useful for project leaders who wish to get started, particularly those from the agricultural world.

Complex projects that require a variety of skills, sharing and dialogue

This dive into the world of Sustainable Food highlights a particular complexity: re-nested activities and functions (from production to consumption) with its share of health standards and professional regulations, chains of actors that require collective governance and the sharing of the values produced, the cross-fertilization of entrepreneurial knowledge with professional knowledge from the agricultural world, food, logistics, multiple and sometimes incompatible financing methods…

From this complexity emerge 2 needs that seem particularly significant to us:

• the need to invent flexible, operational learning methods, combining theoretical knowledge and expertise in use and allowing groups of actors with various statuses to live together an experience and build collective knowledge;
• support for animation and coordination between actors, which are necessarily long to build a common language, trust, and power sharing.

The sharing of experiences, dialogue and existing tools remain unstructured and ad hoc. There is still a lot to be done in this direction and many avenues exist to strengthen these nascent alliances.

Taking into account these shifting borders and increasingly hybrid projects, we have for the first time this year opened the Feeding the Future call for projects to civil society but also to innovative Sustainable Food companies as part of our impact investment strategy.

Summary of the study

What are the crossovers between SSE and Sustainable Food?

• Remarkable inventions in the field that accelerate the decompartmentalization
• The SSE: an approach and a vision to consolidate the agro-ecological and food transition

Prospects for development and needs of sustainable food stakeholders

• Sectors, complexity and alliances: the major trends perceived
• The need for skills, time and private-public collaborations
• What to remember at this stage?

Practical information and resources for project leaders

• SSE support and financing schemes: who to contact?
• The emergence of new forms of financing
• Being eligible for sponsorship: the key points to know

To go further: tools, sites, newsletters, identified analyses

This study was conducted by Florence Bardot, consultant, entrepreneur-partner in a business and employment cooperative in the South-West of France. Combining local development and SSE approaches, its interventions aim to advance and support the actors of the territorial transition, by promoting a constructive dialogue between elected officials, professionals and experts of use/inhabitants. The study was co-authored with Clément Cheissoux, Sustainable Food Program Manager France at the Foundation.

Copyright photos: Chantal Garnier – unsplash.com