Food Tank Summit

21 - 22 January 2015. Food Tank, in partnership with The George Washington (GW) University, organised its 1st Annual Food Tank Summit.

This two-day event featured more than 75 different speakers from the food and agriculture field. Researchers, farmers, chefs, policy makers, government officials, and students will come together panels on topics including; food waste, urban agriculture, family farmers, farm workers, and more.

Published on 1 Feb 2015

The Democratizing Innovation panel discussed the connection between industry and innovation, as well as the challenges of scaling up and scaling out innovative practices.

Keynote speaker John Fisk, Director of the Wallace Center at Winrock International, began the session by defining democratizing innovation as scaling innovations with the purpose of enabling self determination.

Seven panelists spoke about their different approaches to scaling up and scaling out innovations—from shifting investment practices to targeting supply chains—but all were joined by optimism for disruptive food system changes that would make the existing model obsolete.

Panelists also emphasized the importance of bringing together and engaging different stakeholders in the food system, including local governments, smallholder farmers, and public and private sectors in order to drive changes on the ground. WATCH each of the panelists discuss their approach to democratizing innovation:

• John Fisk (Winrock International) on democratizing responsibility and changing the system
• Steve Brescia (Groundswell International) on working with local governments to support small farmers
• Doug Hertzler (ActionAid) on engaging local governments and smallholders
• Jill Isenbarger (Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture) on building active food citizenship
• Aaron McNevin (World Wildlife Fund) on private sector research
• Jessica Rosen (Forum for the Future) on rethinking food system as a value network
• Shen Tong (Food-X) on changing investments to change the industry and doing well

Published on 6 Feb 2015 "Pushing for Better Agriculture Research and Policy" panel

• Keynote: Jerry Glover, United States Agency for International
• Janet Larsen, Earth Policy Institute
• Jahi Chappell, The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy
• Nabeeha Kazi, Humanitas Global, @humanitasglobal
• Pamela Hess, Arcadia Center for Sustainable Food & Agriculture
• Emily Broad Leib, Harvard Law School, @broademily
• Barbara Ekwall, U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization

Jerry Glover, United States Agency for International (USAID)


Janet Larsen, Earth Policy Institute


Nabeeha Kazi Huchins, Humanitas Global


Jahi Chappell, The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP)



 Barbara Ekwall, FAO



Pamela Hess, Arcadia Center for Sustainable Food & Agriculture


Emily Broad Leib, Harvard Law School

Food Tank also posted individual videos of each of the speakers.
Click HERE to read interviews with many of the speakers and Food Tank will be posting photos of the event on their Facebook page HERE.
(Download the Full Program HERE)