Postgraduate Course: Future Food Systems (fusion online) (EFIE11297)
Course Outline
| School | Edinburgh Futures Institute |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
| Course type | Online Distance Learning |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 10 |
ECTS Credits | 5 |
| Summary | The course will explore the importance of sustainable and resilient food systems for achieving healthy people, environments, and animals. Students will be encouraged to focus on food systems using a systems approach that connects individual food practices with impacts on environmental sustainability, human nutrition, and animal welfare. |
| Course description |
This course will introduce students to the vital importance of food systems to a sustainable and habitable planet. Food systems represent complex networks linking natural resource systems with socioeconomic systems that drive supply and demand.
In this course, students will examine key stages of the food system: production, aggregation, processing, distribution, consumption, and waste. We will critically reflect on the challenges of provisioning a growing population and their consumption demands, and the impacts of agricultural practices on the environment. A systems perspective is adopted to explore the multiple connections between activities of food production, processing, distribution and consumption, and the biophysical and socio-economic drivers of change. Throughout the course students will be encouraged to focus on themselves as actors within the food system and how their consumption practices are shape and are shaped by the wider food system. A range of geographical and culture contexts will be explored to identify challenges and opportunities for transformation of food system sustainability and health.
Students will learn through a combination of pre-recorded online lectures and synchronous (online/in-person) lectures and workshops. Pre-intensive content will include a combination of recorded lectures and videos, reading, discussions, and creative activities to encourage critical reflection on the complex connections between food networks and the biophysical and socioeconomic drivers of change. Students will engage in reflective activities and roleplay during the pre-intensive, intensive and post-intensive to explore the multiple actors and values associated with food systems. Lectures will be delivered by academic and professional experts.
Edinburgh Futures Institute (EFI) - Online Fusion Course Delivery Information:
The Edinburgh Futures Institute will teach this course in a way that enables online and on-campus students to study together. This approach (our 'fusion' teaching model) offers students flexible and inclusive ways to study, and the ability to choose whether to be on-campus or online at the level of the individual course. It also opens up ways for diverse groups of students to study together regardless of geographical location. To enable this, the course will use technologies to record and live-stream student and staff participation during their teaching and learning activities. Students should note that their interactions may be recorded and live-streamed. There will, however, be options to control whether or not your video and audio are enabled.
As part of your course, you will need access to a personal computing device. Unless otherwise stated activities will be web browser based and as a minimum we recommend a device with a physical keyboard and screen that can access the internet.
As part of your course, you will need access to a personal computing device. Unless otherwise stated activities will be web browser based and as a minimum we recommend a device with a physical keyboard and screen that can access the internet.
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | None |
Course Delivery Information
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| Academic year 2024/25, Available to all students (SV1)
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Quota: 10 |
| Course Start |
Semester 2 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
100
(
Lecture Hours 6,
Supervised Practical/Workshop/Studio Hours 8,
Online Activities 6,
Formative Assessment Hours 4,
Summative Assessment Hours 6,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 2,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
68 )
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| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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| Additional Information (Assessment) |
Summative Assessment:
The course will be assessed by means of the following assessment components:
1) Portfolio: Transforming Local Food Systems (100%)
Students will design an intervention to promote sustainable food systems along a commodity chain, within a local community, through a national policy, or through a plan promoting sustainable production or consumption.
The portfolio should include an artefact that highlights the area of focus within the food system and a 1500-word plan that explains how a particular intervention can address a clearly defined challenge.
Formative Assessment:
1) Food Diary and Reflection (either real or imagined)
Students will produce a food diary that is either real (as a recollection of their week as a synchronous recording or a previous diet) or imagined (as food is personal students may wish to avoid disclosing their diet and might choose to reflect on a week in the life of an imagined person following the EAT-Lancet diet, for example). This diary can follow any format, but the 7-day diary entries should not exceed 150 words per day or 1500 words in total. Students are encouraged to record food and their reflections on the social, cultural, psychological, political, and/or environmental challenges associated with following or adopting a sustainable diet. |
| Feedback |
This field should be used to describe the assessment and feedback strategies used on the course, along with their indicative pattern and schedule of feedback. Note that each course should include at least one formative feedback or feed-forward event and should not be over-assessed Feedback will be provided throughout the two-day intensive through lecture discussions, seminars, and group activities and discussions.
For the formative assignment, students are required to complete a food diary for Week 4 of the course. Students will receive written feedback in an asynchronous workshop with videos, Miro interactive boards, and discussion boards taking place in Week 5.
Summative feedback will be provided in a written summary that assesses clarity of sustainable food systems portfolio. In particular, the students will be assessed for clarity of communication, vision, and critical reflection. |
| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Demonstrate a critical understanding of the structures and networks constituting food systems and the socioeconomic and environmental drivers of change.
- Evaluate the role of food systems in mitigation and adaptation to climate change.
- Develop a critical awareness of socioeconomic and biophysical divers of change effecting different actors and practices within food systems.
- Research and plan the implementation of an intervention that reimagines a component of the food system.
- Develop independent critical reflective skills that identify existing challenges and potential solutions associated with food systems.
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Reading List
Indicative Reading List:
Essential Reading:
Duncan, J, Carolan, M, & Wiskerke, JSC (eds) (2020) Routledge Handbook of Sustainable and Regenerative Food Systems, Taylor & Francis Group, Oxford.
Kneafsey, M., Maye, D., Holloway, L. and Goodman, M.K. (2021) Geographies of Food: An Introduction. Bloomsbury: London.
Recommended Reading:
Eden, S., Bear, C. and Walker, G., (2008) Mucky carrots and other proxies: problematising the knowledge-fix for sustainable and ethical consumption. Geoforum, 39(2), pp.1044-1057.
Rockström, J., Thilsted, S., Willett, W., Gordon, L., Herrero, M., Agustina, R., Covic, N., Forouhi, N.G., Hicks, C., Fanzo, J. and Kebreab, E., 2023. EAT-Lancet Commission 2.0: securing a just transition to healthy, environmentally sustainable diets for all. The Lancet, 402, pp.352-354.
Willett, W., Rockström, J., Loken, B., Springmann, M., Lang, T., Vermeulen, S., Garnett, T., Tilman, D., DeClerck, F., Wood, A. and Jonell, M., (2019) Food in the Anthropocene: the EAT-Lancet Commission on healthy diets from sustainable food systems. The lancet, 393(10170), pp.447-492.
Further Reading:
Ivanovich, C.C., Sun, T., Gordon, D.R. and Ocko, I.B., 2023. Future warming from global food consumption. Nature Climate Change, 13(3), pp.297-302.
Lindgren, E., Harris, F., Dangour, A.D., Gasparatos, A., Hiramatsu, M., Javadi, F., Loken, B., Murakami, T., Scheelbeek, P. and Haines, A., 2018. Sustainable food systems-a health perspective. Sustainability science, 13, pp.1505-1517.
Monbiot, G., 2022. Regenesis: Feeding the world without devouring the planet. Penguin: London.
Wilson, M., Gathorne-Hardy, A., Alexander, P., & Boden, L. (2018). Why Culture matters for planetary health. The Lancet Planetary Health. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2542-5196(18)30205-5 |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
- Enquiry and lifelong learning (ILOs 1, 2, 3)
- Aspiration and personal development (ILOs 2, 3, 5)
- Outlook and engagement (ILOs 2, 5)
- Research and enquiry (ILOs 3, 4)
- Personal and intellectual autonomy (ILOs 2, 3, 5)
- Personal effectiveness (ILOs 2, 4)
- Communication (ILOs 4) |
| Keywords | Food Systems,Agriculture,Sustainability,EFI,Level 11,Futures,PG |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Rowan Jackson
Tel: (0131 6)51 4340
Email: Rowan.Jackson@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Mr Lawrence East
Tel:
Email: Lawrence.East@ed.ac.uk |
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