Creating more sustainable urban mobility is one of the keys to helping cities reduce their climate impact. However it is only one part of a system wide transformation that needs to take place. How can different sectors come together to work on changing entire systems?
Bringing together different knowledge communities to shape systematic change
Following a workshop at Lafutura, Copenhagen in 2020 it was identified that we need to find more ways to work across sectors to solve city challenges. This inspired three of the eight EIT Knowledge Innovation Communities, 1) Food, 2) Urban Mobility and 3) Climate to collaborate at the H22 City Expo.
On 31 May, the three communities hosted a co-creation workshop on the future of sustainable urban food logistics. Urban food logistics is a complex system which requires the perspectives of many actors, should we want to change it to be more sustainable. From urban food producers to city planners, to specialised transport companies, to packaging experts – the list goes on.
The workshop brought together the different communities to brainstorm ideas on what the future of sustainable urban food logistics will look like, and to provide insights on how we can plan for, and determine where to invest to realise our ambitions.
The Participants – Food, Urban Logistics and Climate
Across the three communities there was a great diversity of people and perspectives at the workshop, including industry representatives, academia, NGO’s, public administrators and start-ups.
The Workshop – Using the futures literacy method for cocreation
The half-day workshop in Mindpark, Helsingborg was facilitated using the futures literacy method by Lena Tünkers and Solla Zophoniasdottir from Climate KIC.
- The participants started by coming together to paint a shared picture of the probable future of urban food logistics (see it in action in the video below).
- Following this, in smaller groups everyone got creative with some clay and many post it’s to imagine their desirable futures for urban food logistics in 2040. A graphic artist translated peoples desirable futures from clay and post its into succinct posters, seen in images above.
- The participants then built a map of assumptions which supported the desirable futures that had been painted in the previous part of the workshop.
- Finally, and the more challenging part of the workshop, and of the futures literacy method was to imagine an alternative future, something you would not naturally imagine through an unfamiliar lens.
The participants ended the day by writing themselves a postcard to be received in the future as a reminder as to what action/s they can take away from the workshop. EIT Urban Mobility, EIT Food and EIT Climate KIC are looking forward to continuing the discussion at a follow up event in after the summer.
