Opening the webinar, Corinna Hawkes, Director of the Food Systems and Food Safety Division at FAO stated, "Empowering cities through multi-level governance is crucial for effective food systems transformation beyond city boundaries." She highlighted the significant impact of urban activities on broader levels, stressing the need to align urban management with national and regional strategies.  

Charlotte Flechet, Global Programme Director for Good Food for Cities at Rikolto, presented initial findings from a FAO-Rikolto study on enablers and constraints in transforming food systems through multi-level governance. The study identified four areas to strengthen cooperation between national and sub-national governments: decentralization, which may empower subnational authorities to leverage taxes and revenues for food system transformation; an overarching policy framework setting a clear food vision and mandate for subnational authorities; reliable data from a well-resourced information system; and addressing financial and human resources constraints. Rikolto and FAO will continue their research to develop a framework for multi-level food systems governance in the coming year. 

The webinar featured two panel discussions with representatives from local, regional, and national authorities in Indonesia and South Africa. The first discussion focused on Indonesia's decentralized food policy framework, featuring Jarot Indarto, Director for Food and Agriculture at the Ministry of National Development Planning, and Fathir Fajar Sidiq, Head of the Research, Development, and Innovation Division at the Regional Development Planning Agency of Depok City, West Java. The panelists emphasized the critical role of coordination across national, provincial, and district levels, as mandated by the 2012 Food Law for integrated policies aligned with national development plans. A key challenge is the lack of comprehensive local data for policy formulation, addressed by using the Food Systems Dashboard. Indonesia's diverse food security situations require flexible, context-specific national policy implementation, exemplified by Depok's "One Day No Rice" initiative, encouraging alternative carbohydrate consumption weekly to maintain food resilience. 

The second discussion featured Tristan Görgens, Director of Policy, Strategy and Research at the Western Cape Government and Tamsin Faragher, Principal Resilience Officer at the City of Cape Town. The Western Cape Government and the City of Cape Town recognized the crucial role of their collaboration in implementing the provincial food and nutrition security strategy and the   City’s Resilience Strategy, launched in 2019. The COVID-19 pandemic reinforced their joint efforts, requiring coordinated actions to address hunger. Cape Town’s Food System programme, adopted in 2021, is embedded into the city’s five-year Integrated Development Plan, which facilitates collaboration and prioritization of food-related work across local and regional institutions. 

The collaboration between the City of Cape Town and the Western Cape Government has succeeded due to strong networks, partnerships, and effective interdepartmental and multi-stakeholder processes. The city-led Food Systems Working Group leverages external knowledge through liaising with a research community of practice, the provincial government, and the national Department of Agriculture. Challenges remain in overcoming institutional silos, balancing competing needs, navigating the complexity of the food system, and improving collaboration with civil society. 

Guido Santini, Coordinator of the CRFS Programme at FAO, shared his take-aways from the discussions: i) the importance of smartly distributing power between national and subnational levels to avoid institutional inertia; ii) the need to build trust and foster a shared intention to collaborate rather than compete; iii) the challenge of accessing and managing local data, underscoring the need for effective information-sharing mechanisms; and iv) how creating spaces for dialogue between national and subnational levels fosters collaboration and ensuring policy coherence.  

In closing, Yurdi Yasmi, Special Coordinator of the Plant Protection and Production Division at FAO, framed governance as a collective effort involving researchers, community organizations, academia, and youth, all vital in shaping the future of cities: "Only by learning together, by cross-fertilizing, can we move forward to address future challenges." 

The recording of the webinar is available here.