More and more citizens live in cities. Metropolitan areas usually also mean that green space is scarce, the distance between city and countryside is quite large, aspects of the living environment are under pressure and healthy eating is less accessible or self-evident. Cities and the hinterland are the driving force in the transition to a new food system.

Almere is such a fast growing city. Located at the junction of the Amsterdam Metropolitan Area and the countryside, where city and country meet, Almere is excellently positioned to be a green and healthy city. The city would like its citizens to eat fresh and healthy food from the regional food chain. Flevo Campus was founded with this aim in mind.

Almere will almost double in size in the coming 30 years. Flevo Campus was initiated by Almere’s city council to support the city’s future growth with investments in the educational and research sector. Flevo Campus is a scientific hotspot for innovations, in which students, researchers and businesses are brought together to explore and test how food provisioning can change and innovate in growing cities.

Flevo Campus is a collaborative effort between AMS Institute, Aeres University of Applied Sciences Almere, City of Almere, and the Province of Flevoland. AMS Institute leads the Flevo Campus research program and as from January 2017 various exploratory studies have started. Involvement of all Flevo Campus partners and stakeholders provide a Living Lab setting that enables to valorize our research in practice in public city governance as well as in business opportunities.

Flevo Campus partners jointly organize summer schools, think tanks, business challenges, business vouchers, and events such as Flevo Campus Live and Floriade Dialogues.

AMS Research projects part of the Flevo Campus program "Feeding the City" are:

Project

Evidence Based Food System Design

Metropolitan Food Systems

Feeding people in a growing metropolitan city challenges the production, supply, consumption and removal of food. This project uses data to outline scenarios and integrate the flow of food added to the growing evidence for future food systems.

Project

Eat your city

Metropolitan Food Systems

Three areas in Almere were sampled to explore if naturally growing products can feed people. Research answered whether online libraries listing the occurrences of animals and plants were reliable and how citizens may contribute to local food systems.

Project

Searching for Food Prosumers

Metropolitan Food Systems

Prosument' is a contraction of the words 'producer' and 'consumer' and therefore concerns someone who has (partly) produced what he/she consumes himself/herself. This project investigates food prosumption in the City of Almere.

Project

Sustainability Potential of Urban Food

Metropolitan Food Systems

A project to analyze an urban food system from a spatial perspective. In a hybrid urban metabolism (UM) and input-output (IO) modeling approach, the economic and environmental dimensions of Almere’s food system will be assessed.

Project

Sustainable Local Food Distribution

Metropolitan Food Systems

Many localization initiatives in food supply chains aim at sustainability benefits, which may or may not be realistic. This study aims to explore this problem area, providing a step towards evidence-based decision-making in food supply chains.

Duration:
  • January 2017
Related Information:

Partners

Flevo Campus
Gemeente Almere
Provincie Flevoland
Aeres University of Applied Sciences