Horizon Project FOODMISSION
Project Information
Title: Engaging citizens as agents of change for sustainable food system transition with a novel gamified educational citizen science platform
Acronym: FOODMISSION
DOI: 10.3030/101181774
Start Date: 1 January 2025
End Date: 30 June 2028
Funded under: Horizon – Food, Bioeconomy, Natural Resources, Agriculture and Environment
Total cost: € 4.997.966,25
Coordinated by Western Norway University of Applied Sciences
About FOODMISSION
FOODMISSION helps citizens make informed, healthy and sustainable food choices by combining citizen science, gamification and education. Its central output is a digital platform on which people record their food practices, see the environmental impact of their choices, take part in sustainability challenges and reach educational content on nutrition and food waste.
The project also runs Transformation Labs (T-Labs): multi-actor spaces that bring citizens together with food producers, retailers, NGOs, public administration, research institutions and policymakers to co-create solutions. The consortium brings together 10 partners from 8 countries.
Context
The transition to a fair, healthy and sustainable European food system, as set out in the European Green Deal and the Farm to Fork Strategy, depends on changes in everyday consumption as much as on changes in production.
Citizens, however, rarely have accessible tools or reliable feedback that connect their food choices to health and environmental outcomes, and their experience seldom reaches policy design.
Vision & Mission
FOODMISSION turns everyday food decisions into a source of evidence and a lever for systemic change. It develops a citizen science data framework alongside an engagement framework based on game mechanics, and integrates both into a co-designed platform.
The platform is piloted and evaluated in six European countries, and the resulting insights feed into recommendations for policy and for the food industry.
Our Objectives
- Set up Transformation Labs that support the project through all phases, from co-design to uptake.
- Design a citizen science data framework for collecting and processing citizen-generated data on food practices.
- Design a citizen motivation and engagement framework that empowers both individual and collective change.
- Co-develop the FOODMISSION platform prototype together with its content and activities.
- Pilot and evaluate the platform in six European countries.
- Promote the project’s key exploitable results so that they are taken up across Europe.
Our role
The University of Thessaly is one of the ten consortium partners and one of two Greek participants. The Agricultural Economics and Consumer Behaviour Lab contributes its expertise in regional development, sustainability assessment and consumer behaviour.
This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon Europe research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 101181774. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the granting authority. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.