Next Generation Food Futures Network

Researchers from THUAS (The Hague University of Applied Sciences), Sant’Anna School of Advanced Studies in Pisa (Italy), Kauno Kolegija (Lithuania), and the University of Poznań (Poland) will jointly develop a European network focused on shifting the role of the next generation from recipients to active drivers of food system change. The consortium brings together a wide array of complementary expertise.
The partners will use the Food Boost Challenge (FBC) as a conceptual and methodological starting point. The FBC is a challenge-based learning approach in which young people co-create and implement interventions to improve their own food environments. Within this project, the consortium will not actually implement the FBC, but will explore how this approach can be adapted and embedded across different European contexts.
Guided by a shared conceptual framework (of which a first draft is included in the main tekst of this application), the collaboration focuses on interconnected domains of food system change, including healthy and sustainable diets, food skills and food security; safe and sustainable food innovation; food environments and social dimensions; implementation, social marketing and entrepreneurship; and prevention and governance systems. The framework supports an iterative process in which partners identify complementarities, overlaps, and gaps in expertise.
The network aims to strengthen collaboration around practice-oriented implementation science and to build the foundations for a sustainable European partnership. Through structured exchange and alignment, the consortium will prepare a joint proposal for future European funding opportunities. By positioning youth agency as a central driver, the consortium contributes to the objectives of Europe’s Farm to Fork Strategy, supporting the transition towards healthier, more sustainable, and socially embedded food systems. This positioning ensures that sufficient relevant calls are expected to emerge during the project period, enabling the consortium to submit a joint application.