TITAN organized an interesting webinar under its Key Expertise Area on “Following the Food System Approach,” inviting two experts in the field who addressed innovation ecosystems and global food systems monitoring.
Ryan Edwards (Naked Innovations, Spain) opened the session with a presentation on “Transforming and Innovating the Agri-Food Industry.” Drawing from his extensive experience with major agri-food corporations and innovation ecosystems, Ryan emphasized the need to:
- Empower diverse, purpose-driven teams to drive food systems transformation.
- Move from isolated innovation toward ecosystem models, where corporations, researchers, policymakers, and communities co-create solutions.
- Scale innovation through living labs and regional initiatives, using real-world challenges as entry points to transformation.
- Highlighted examples included alternative protein ecosystems in Catalonia and a venture-building program co-led with EIT Food to bridge the innovation-business gap in Southern Europe.
Roseline Remans (Food Systems Countdown Initiative) followed with insights from the recent 2025 report “Monitoring Progress and Navigating Interactions in Food Systems Transformation.” She introduced a comprehensive multi-indicator framework built collaboratively by different institutions: FAO, GAIN, Columbia University, and Cornell.
Her key points included:
- The Food Systems Countdown addresses the lack of holistic monitoring tools by tracking 50+ indicators across five thematic areas: governance, environment, nutrition, livelihoods, and resilience. The 2025 report revealed that only 20 of 42 measurable indicators are trending positively, underscoring the slow pace of transformation.
- Tools like the Food Systems Dashboard and interactive network maps allow countries and stakeholders to explore indicator interactions, potential trade-offs, and systemic leverage points.
- Importance of anticipating unintended consequences and highlighted case studies from Ethiopia, Mexico, and the Netherlands to illustrate governance dynamics and regional differences.
Together, the speakers underscored the value of aligning grassroots innovation and top-down monitoring to enable systems-level change. Ryan offered real-world examples of how ecosystems can bring solutions to market, while Roseline provided the scientific framework to assess whether these changes move us in the right direction.
You can watch the full webinar below:
English