Vitaal Food Community 2024

19 February 2024
Community, News

On Friday, January 26th 2024, over 80 people gathered at Omnia in Wageningen, including 12 farmers and horticulturists, to discuss the various facets of vital food. The meeting was organised by the Vital Food Community, which was initiated 2 years ago. Without a budget, a group of passionate people worked hard to further expand the community. This involves taking a holistic view, looking not only at the substances in healthy food, but also at the life force of food.

The motto: ‘The farmer as doctor of the future’. As a community, we are now ready to start activities.

Kees Anker explained the Vital Food Community (video chapter and pdf). The community uses the following principles:

  • Combining strength, knowledge and expertise
  • The whole chain from vital soil, vital plants and animals, vital food to vital people
  • Communicating the importance of vital or life-giving food and conducting research.
  • Conduct research: both Science-based and Experience-based
  • Building and strengthening networks. The ambitions are in the presentation.
  • Link to other networks
  • Contribution to transition of the food system

Panel debate (video chapter)

The participants interacted with: 

  • Marjon Wijdeven of Vital Food Management workts on ‘from quality to vitality’. Since 2016 she has also been involved with Herenboeren.
  • Volkert Engelsman, founder of Eosta and the Robin Food Coalition, committed to the new normal where health and inclusion are central. And with FQH (Organic Food Quality & Health): health is more than the absence of disease, it’s also about diversity, quality and vitality.
  • Bert van Ruitenbeek of Stichting Demeter. There were seers concerned about the use of fertilisers already 100 years ago. He is also one of the initiators of the Green Farmers Plan (Groenboerenplan).

Volkert distinguishes 3 layers in the vitality of food:

  1. Physical: without chemicals and balans in contents
  2. Flavour and ability to differentiate. Common lettuce, for example, lacks the ability to multiply
  3. Ability of a crop to connect to a primal image. This is very different with genetically modified varieties.

According to Bert, food vitality is a broad concept. Among other things, it is about processing – we need to go back to as little processed food as possible. But it also has to do with connection. Of the farmer with his crops and animals, but also as a community. Hundreds of thousands of people visit BD farms.

There is a tsunami of diseases of affluence and many people want to eat toxin-free.

Marjon: “Poison-free is a great basis, process improvement is also needed. Many people have never thought about how something is grown. It is necessary to make people aware. You are not going to convince people with a research method, but through head, heart and gut.”

Read on in the full report for the questions from the audience and the panel’s answers and links to the individual presentations and workshop materials. Further documents will be added to this report over the coming weeks.

Presentation Mark Frederiks (Amped)

Presentation Mark Frederiks (pdf)
Video chapter

Mark Frederiks talks about how we are developing the Vital Food Community. He is a game developer and mainly concerned with short chains, including in the Amsterdam Metropolitan Region. Around Amsterdam, many farmers have found their way to the market.

First we identified each other and then looked at what everyone is good at.

With the community participants and customer groups around us, we have a huge network. New structures are not needed that way.

We missen 20%, en focussen ons op 80%. En vragen overheid, banken etc. om het missende deel op te vullen. Dat doen we vanuit onze kracht. De systemen werken ons nu tegen. We moeten ons gaan organiseren. Het gaat om BBBBB: bodem, boer, burger, bedrijven, buik, en beheer voor de borging.

We miss 20%, and focus on 80%. And ask government, banks etc to fill the missing part. We do that from our strengths. The systems are working against us now. We need to get organised. It’s all about BBBBB: soil (Bodem), farmer (Boer), citizen (Burger), belly (Buik) and governance (Beleid) for assurence.

Presentation keynote speaker Pablo Tittonell (pdf)
Video chapter

Pablo Tittonell, Professor of Agroecology and Sustainability (University of Groningen), talks about his research on Regenerative Agriculture and its relationship with health/vitality. In his illustrative presentation, he discusses, among other things:

  • What is regenerative agriculture?
  • The microbiome: the soil-food-human nexus
  • Is regenerative agriculture the same as agroecology?

Summary drawing by Iris Flamand (Louis Bolk Institute)

Workshops (complete report)

  1. Vital Food and Measurement Methods
  2. Regenerative agriculture
  3. Vital nutrition and the human microbiome
  4. Vital water
  5. Symphony of Soils about vital soil
  6. The reality behind frequencies

Conclusion
“It was an inspiring and very informative meeting”, according to several participants at the closing. Many people discussed and networked after the meeting in the bar afterwards. Click here for the Vital Food Community 2024 photo album.

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