Community Food Champions Project

The Community Food Champions Project turns lived experience into local action, empowering communities to create sustainable solutions to food inequity and improve wellbeing for children, young people and families

Between 2024 and 2025, Barnardo’s undertook a number of initiatives to explore food inequity and its impact on children and young people. The research highlighted how structural barriers limit access to healthy food, particularly for those experiencing poverty and wider social inequalities.

Links to previous reports:

https://weareseen.org.uk/projects/driving-healthyfutures-project/

https://www.barnardos.org.uk/research/nourishing-future

https://www.barnardos.org.uk/research/co-op-a-recipe-for-success

https://www.barnardos.org.uk/research/co-op-deeper-roots-stronger-futures

Across the UK, around 17% of children live in households that cannot consistently access healthy food. This contributes to poorer diets, increased health inequalities, and a greater risk of long-term health conditions. The evidence also showed that children, young people and families of African, Asian and Caribbean (AAC) heritage can experience additional barriers linked to poverty, food insecurity and limited access to culturally appropriate food.

An evidence review commissioned by SEEN found that AAC communities are more likely to experience food insecurity, face challenges accessing affordable and nutritious food, and encounter food aid and health information that does not always reflect their cultural needs and lived experiences. The review highlighted the importance of developing culturally inclusive approaches alongside wider action to address the social, economic and environmental factors that drive food inequity.

Barnardo’s wider research also identified several key themes:

• Trusted community relationships are essential in tackling food inequity
• Communities have a powerful role in shaping local food systems and driving change
• Children and young people should be meaningfully involved in decisions that affect their access to food and wellbeing

Our Approach

Building on this evidence, and to follow recommendations made in prior research, Barnardo’s SEEN is working on project named Community Food Champions, using a place-based, community-led approach to explore solutions that can improve food equity for AAC children, young people and families, piloting the approach in Southampton. The project recognises that experiences of food inequity are shaped by multiple, intersecting factors and will consider how characteristics such as gender, disability, citizenship status and socioeconomic circumstances can create additional barriers to accessing healthy, affordable and culturally appropriate food.

Through meaningful community engagement, the project will identify local priorities and co-design solutions that reflect the diverse needs, strengths and experiences of AAC communities.

The project aims to support sustainable, community-led action through the recruitment and development of Community Food Champions, who will help deliver interventions designed by and for their communities. By embedding co-production throughout the process, the project will develop a scalable model that can be adapted and replicated across other communities seeking to address food inequity.