We present the new projects 2019!

7 projects of Shared Workshops for a sustainable food system, from our line of work in Sustainable Food, and 5 projects of Composing Knowledge to understand contemporary challenges, from our line of work in Citizen Art, are the selected projects

Yesterday, in Madrid, in the Matadero terrarium, we held our usual Kick-Off Seminar in order to receive and welcome the new projects selected within the framework of the 2019 calls, chosen by the Foundation based on the recommendations of two exceptional Juries . It was a festive day, to share experiences and create synergies between people, projects and disciplines.

Building the food transition

The initiatives chosen within the framework of the Shared Workshops for a sustainable food system call have been:

Belardi, Collective Meat Processing Centre in Orduña (Vizcaya): over the next two years, it will set up a small multi-species slaughter centre, with a cutting room, meat workshop, pre-cooked food kitchen and training room linked to the marketing of meat products. The 42 member farmhouses of the Bedarbide association will participate in it and will be open to others. It is located in a livestock region linked to communal pastures between Vizcaya and Álava. It will contribute to improving the profitability of farms and their transferability to the new livestock farmers in the upper Nervión.

Shared multi-use agri-food centre in Aguraín (Álava): over the next year, the Lautadako Lekaleak Association will adapt and equip two spaces to collectively optimise resources, select and package legumes, or other grains, with health registration. It will provide services to small organic producers, or not, professional, or not, who sell in short circuits. It will be located in the Llanada Alavesa, in a warehouse owned by the municipality of San Millán/Donemiliaga.

Shared workshop in Carcaboso (Cáceres): it will revalue local productions and traditional knowledge in the production of women in this town 10 kilometres from Plasencia, which will be launched at the end of 2019. It has the support of the Provincial Council of Cáceres, and will take advantage of the municipal gardens, its own and the local dairy cattle to produce canned vegetables (purees and porridges) for organic child food, dairy products and derivatives (yogurt, cheese, etc.).

Shared workshop for a sustainable food system (Valladolid): in the next two years a space for transformation and collective distribution will be created to produce organic products from Valladolid (and the surrounding area) in four lines: cereals (with and without gluten), vegetables, fruit and legumes. In addition, a line of allergen-free foods will be included. It will be managed collectively by the VallaEcolid Association, a regional social initiative that aims to welcome, coordinate and articulate the organic and small-scale sector of Castilla y León.

Organic workshop of the Subbética de Cabra (Cordoba): the Association of Producers and Consumers Subbética Ecológica will create a workshop to produce preserves, jams and other organic products, which cover the needs of the people and associated producing entities in order to guarantee a local distribution channel. It will offer more than 500 families and consumer organisations access to organic food at a fair price in the region of Subbética, in the centre of Andalusia, with a radius of action of 150 km.

Obrador de La Vall (Valencia): it was born from the need of organic farmers in the area to create a common workspace in which to transform their productions into quality, differentiated and non-perishable food, offering an opportunity for agroecological development to various local rural projects. It will transform vegetables into jams, dried fruits, vegan pre-cooked products, and will also have a healthy catering service, as well as a place for training. To this end, the Otos City Council has ceded a space of the old municipal school, which will be renovated and conditioned.

S’Obrador de Binissalem (Mallorca): the non-profit organisation APAEMA (which has 400 members and works to promote Agroecology in Mallorca and promote initiatives that activate the rural environment and the organic sector), will improve the equipment of a workshop located in Binissalem (Mallorca) shared with the Fruits secs cooperative, where the production service is carried out for its producer partners.

Connecting art, science and society

The initiatives chosen in the context of the call to compose knowledge to understand contemporary challenges were:

Drafts of the future. Stories and fabulations about possible worlds (Álava): his project will last 16 months, and will create counter-narratives to deal with socio-ecological emergencies. Since 2019 they have been generating a collection of speculative narratives and short stories (created through individual or collective initiatives) that are projected into the future in the face of current challenges (ecological, economic, cultural, social, etc.), in order to glimpse what would happen if existing alternatives were to expand. They have the support of Unai Pascual, a leading scientist at the Basque Centre for Climate Change and co-author of an intergovernmental report on global biodiversity. And it will be carried out from Azala, in Álava, a creation space with 10 years of experience, located in Lasierra, a town of 12 inhabitants.

Care/Full (Barcelona): it is based on the need, and motivation, to weave communicative, practical and cooperative links between academic criticism, artistic practice, citizenship and social-subaltern criticism to ask what constitutes a neighbourhood-structure, beyond a geographical territory. To this end, they will develop mapping actions, configure informal networks of support and care, celebration, transversal learning and ways of living in common with which to create and strengthen the network of citizens and agents in struggle.

Instituto Mutante de Narrativas Ambientales (Madrid): arises as a new line of work of Matadero to promote projects that contribute to overcoming traditional ecological discourses by proposing art, fiction and interdisciplinary creation strategies as engines of change. They will launch and give continuity to the Institute’s network, the Platform-A, formed by the Center for Innovation in Technology for Human Development-itdUPM, the Area of Environment and Mobility of the Madrid City Council, as well as the Matadero itself.

Sustainable municipalities, day by day in the face of climate change, a joint initiative of Vejer and Conil de la Frontera (Cádiz): the BeeTime SCA project was born from the lack of artistic and scientific content connected to local problems in their work context. It will collaborate with the research group on climate change of the University of Cádiz, the Campus of International Excellence of the Sea, and the climatological observatories of the province, around a traveling educational exhibition. Sustainable Municipalities will therefore address climate change in the area of La Janda, based on scientific information that is easily assimilated and transmitted in a creative way. It will also carry out parallel actions to encourage participation in the design of solutions through workshops with young people, conferences and work tables.

Planet Debug. Video games, knowledge, serendipity and co-creation in the puzzle of climate change (Castellón): researchers from various areas of knowledge of the Universitat Jaume I will collaborate with the Degree in Video Game Creation of the same university, as well as with cultural agents, around various actions that mix ecology, video games and education. In particular, they will launch a Living Lab to innovate in research processes that address the challenge of climate change and sustainability through video games and gamification, benefiting university, middle and primary school students.

We invite you to explore all these wonderful initiatives, as well as to follow their evolution in the coming years and to share their experiences, because by building the present, from Sustainable Food and Citizen Art, we enable a better future.

Photo: © Nacho Marcos