Minutes: Food Poverty Network Meeting Date Monday January 26 th 2015 Venue Time safefood offices, Dublin, Cork and FSA NI Offices 2.00am 4.30pm Attendance Bertrand Maitre (BM) Research Officer, Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) Sharon Gilmore (SG) Food Standards Agency NI Ian McClure (IMC) Health Development Policy Branch, DHSSPS Lorraine Fahy (LF) Institute of Public Health Sinéad Keenan (SK) Project Co-ordinator, Healthy Food for All Collette Rogers (CR) Public Health Agency Victoria O Dwyer (VO D) Research Fellow, safefood Laura Keaver (LK) Research Fellow, safefood Dr Cliodhna Foley Nolan (CFN) Director HHN, safefood Claire Wright (CW) Health Development Policy Branch, DHSSPS Ruth Balmer (RB) Food Standards Agency, NI Deirdre Bodkin (DB) Department of Social Protection, Social Inclusion Unit Apologies Marian Faughnan (MF) Gary McFarlane (GMF) Grace Kelly (GK) Meabh Austin (MA) Jim Walsh (JW) Sharron Carlin (SC) Una McConnell (UMC) Chief Specialist in Nutrition, safefood co-chair, Public Health Alliance island of Ireland (PHAII) Research Assistant, Poverty and Social Exclusion (QUB) Council for Homelessness Northern Ireland (CHNI) Department of Social Protection, Social Inclusion Unit Department of Social Development (DSD) Department of Social Development (DSD) 1. Welcome CFN opened the meeting and welcomed all attendees. Apologies were noted.
2. Minutes from meeting held November 3 rd 2014 and any matters arising Minutes of previous meeting November 3 rd, 2014 were accepted and there were two items discussed. 1. Additional funding opportunities HffA: The FIRM funding is allocated to research institutions in ROI, although they would welcome collaborations with NI partners. The next call for funding is to be advertised at the end of the month with a deadline for applications in May. The funding seems to be more related to technical areas/food product development. More information is available here: http://www.agriculture.gov.ie/research/foodinstitutionalresearchmeasurefirm/. HFfA will have an internal meeting in February to discuss submitting a proposal and will keep the Network informed of any planned meeting. 2. PHA s updates: CR shared a summary of PHA s investments in food poverty to date and a copy of the Joseph Rowntree Report. The Joseph Rowntree Evidence Review (Aug 2014) states that they intend to prepare a strategy for the UK with specific activity for Northern Ireland available in 2016. ACTION: 1 safefood will share these two documents with the Network. IMC will look into what representatives in NI the JRF are in contact with in relation to this work. Update- 11/2/15: IMC contacted Chris Goulden at JRF who advised that their original intention was to produce strategies for each nation but now the plan is to enter discussions with those doing strategies in NI, Wales & Scotland to explore how we might influence them with our evidence and the UK anti-poverty "blueprint". He advised that Dave Wall is their main contact in NI and sits on the programme advisory group. ACTION: 2 CR will circulate the Belfast City Council Framework document for review when it has been ratified by the Belfast city council and is finalized. GENERAL UPDATES: Fare share: MA disseminated the terms of reference for the Belfast Food Network with the Food Poverty Network. A scoping exercise will take place across NI on food banks and will be available in 2015. FSA: RB updated on the food poverty evidence base review research that took place in January 2015. As part of this, a literature review was drawn up and workshops/focus groups were held with 14 external stakeholders with an interest/ experience in food poverty and some members of the all island food poverty network. This is part of a wider research report due to be finalized by the end of March 2015. During the focus groups potential actions were scoped out and developed. A full report will be made available on this work from the FSA. Overall, 4 key areas were identified for recommended action 1. Indicator to pool data to create an indicator for NI 2. Policy/programme mapping- to co-ordinate and strengthen current mapping so as not to duplicate work already completed & to have a current active tool. 3. CFI- to work to lessen duplication of work- with co-ordination, planning and mapping of work. To reduce short term funding of CFIs. 4. Local government reform & community involvement -11 new councils will be created in 2015. They will be mandated to create new plans in 2015. The Network should aim to have community kept on the agenda in planning here.
ESRI: BM - in relation to the NI Indicator work, Mary Scarlett (NISRA) will be put in contact with the ESRI to discuss the ROI indicator work. To date one year of data has been collected from three questions. Direct comparisons may be made with the data, similarly to previous work in ROI. Membership of the Network was discussed: ACTION: 3 CR will speak to SC re a DSD representative at the network and possibly the Dept. of agriculture and rural development (DARD) as well. ACTION: 4 CFN will discuss possible representation from Healthy Ireland or the Dept. of Health. A new member of staff has taken over the FEAD work in the DSP they will be invited to join the Network meetings when topics on the agenda are relevant to their work. ACTION5: DB will pass on the new contact details of the FEAD representative. DSP: DB - DSP: DB - 2013 SILC data The CSO have published only the top line results on main poverty indicators for 2013. The full data required for the calculation of the food poverty rate will not be available for further data analysis by the ESRI until mid- February. The food poverty rate for 2013 will be published as a contextual indicator in the Social Inclusion Monitor 2013 which is due for publication by end quarter 1. The DSP is meeting to discuss research plans with the ESRI at the end of February, and the food poverty indicator is on the agenda. The subject of the presentation for the event in April may/may not be in relation to SILC data. The FEAD work might be an option but this is still at preliminary stages. ACTION 6: Jim Walsh has asked that the Network send him the outline of the presentation requested for the event in April. HFfA: SK HFfA are hosting a workshop next Wednesday on the School Meals Programme in Donegal- with schools that are not currently availing of the funds. They are also hosting a national food poverty event in Dublin April 15 th on Children and Food Poverty. IPH: LF will finalize the trend data research and present on the work at the workshop April 21 st. ESRI: BM only two items have been released in relation to the SILC 2013 data. Further mining of the data will take place once the 3 rd item is released. Food poverty figures will be updated then. This is due to be ready March 2015. safefood: CFN - Draft Food basket research documents have been sent through and will shortly be sent for publication. The NI report is due to be finalized March 2015. DHSSPS: IMC A Fitter Future for All 2012-2022 (AFFFA) - In December 2014 an update report for AFFFA covering the first two years, 2012-2014, was published online. http://www.dhsspsni.gov.uk/a_fittter_future_for_all_update_report_2012_-_2014. The existing outcomes from AFFFA are currently being reviewed and updated for the period 2015-2019 through the Obesity Prevention Steering Group. Food Poverty is included within the existing outcomes. Health Survey Northern Ireland - (HSNI) - In November 2014 the first results of the HSNI 2013/14 were published online at: http://www.dhsspsni.gov.uk/hsni-first-results- 13-14.pdf. Food Security - Fewer than one in ten respondents (7%) reported that they had not eaten a substantial meal in the last fortnight due to a lack of money, while 1%
stated that they had ever cut the size of a child s meal because they did not have enough money. Making Life Better- (MLB) - The NI Executive s new overarching public health strategy was published online in June 2014. http://www.dhsspsni.gov.uk/index/phealth/php/making-life-better.htm This framework, built on the previous health strategy investing for Health, sets the strategic direction for 2013-2023 and aims to improve health and reduce health inequalities. It proposes as a vision - all people are enabled and supported in achieving their full health and wellbeing potential Workshop April 2015 ACTION 7: RB will send the details of the 14 stakeholders to safefood to invite to the workshop. ACTION 8: safefood will send out a draft invitation list and draft agenda/timings for the event, for review by the Network. ACTION 9: safefood will follow up on the discussions between Mary Scarlett & BM re the HS NI research presentation. ACTION 10: All Network members to suggest possible venues for the event April 21 st if possible and a list of venues will be disseminated between the Network for comment/decision. ACTION 11: MA to share the Fareshare evaluation report when it is finalized. DB suggested that there might be a role for members of the Network to promote and encourage more research on the food poverty indicator subject to the confirmation that the required meta data is deposited by the CSO in the Irish Social Science Data Archive (ISSDA) in UCD. If so, the Network could encourage collaborative research which incorporated comparative analysis of the NI/ROI data, subject to there being an academic or institutional interest. ACTION: 12 BM will look into this and share with VO D. (Bertrand has subsequently confirmed availability of data variables required from ISSDA). ACTION: 13 BM will find out if there is any update on the work carried out previously by GK, with Queens. ACTION PLAN 2015: ACTION 14: CR will send VO D additional text for the community aspect of the Food Poverty Network 2015 action plan. Due to the lack of awareness of the Network at the FSA research focus groups an introductory talk will be given around the background, function, current/future work, contact details of the Network, how to send relevant data through etc., in order to inform the invitees and make the Network accessible. ACTION 15: the re-drafted Action plan will be recirculated by safefood.
ACTION 16: DB to share the all party parliamentary inquiry into food poverty in the UK report. Members to review the 32 recommendations and pick out 1 or 2 possible points to help guide work on the 4 topics of the Action plan. Next meeting: April 21 st 2015 NICVA office Belfast