Food Tank is launching two collaborative efforts over the next year with support from the McKnight Foundation. These projects will marshal increased awareness and research on democratizing innovation and true cost accounting while honing in on the Collaborative Crop Research Program’s goal to collaborate with smallholder farmers, leading local researchers and development practitioners while exploring solutions to sustainable, local food systems. 

Food Tank will assess how agricultural innovation spreads among communities and in rich and poor countries alike and the potential for those practices to be replicated, scaled up and used around the world. In addition, the organization will be working with collaborators and partners to highlight the work being done around true cost accounting in the food system. 

The partnership will help significantly scale up, broaden and deepen the interconnectedness of global agriculture problems through research, strategic collaborations, events, webinars, videos, databases and more. 

“Food Tank is incredibly excited to collaborate with the McKnight Foundation on these issues. It’s more important than ever to find ways for farmers, businesses, and policymakers to replicate innovations and understand the true cost of food,” says Danielle Nierenberg, president of Food Tank. 

Farmers, scientists, researchers, NGOs and others are currently creating innovative, on-the-ground solutions for a more nourished world. At the same time, the high prices consumers pay for food rarely reflect the true cost of its ingredients, from fertilizer production and water use to land degradation and greenhouse gas emissions. Food Tank’s partnership with McKnight Foundation will share groundbreaking innovations in agriculture and highlight the true cost of cheap food.

“Across programs, collaboration is at the heart of McKnight’s interests; it is explicit in our mission statement and in our guiding values,” said Jane Maland Cady, international programs director at McKnight Foundation. 

Throughout 2014 and 2015, noteworthy activities will include: