TAST'in FIVES Journal 3: State of Play after 3 years of UIA funding

A stringent array of activities, challenges and learnings have taken place in the TAST’in FIVES project, two years after the latest project’s Journal was published. This one, officially the 3rd one, will not account for all the detailed developments and individual steps which have led the project to where it stands now. Rather, it will build upon the overall achievements of the whole project to prefigurate the after UIA phase. As such, we are providing a transversal analysis with some first steps back which, hopefully, can support the project’s partners in the finalisation of the project as well as other cities willing to embark on a similar journey.

As we discussed in an article published on the UIA website, the UIA TAST’in FIVES project, has aimed at using the concept of food (from growing, picking up, preparing, cooking, to eating) to propose a systemic model to fight against urban poverty, including social and economic inclusion, health, education, and empowerment. The rationale for such an approach was already detailed in the 1st Journal of the project.

We have seen indeed, that the project has sought to provide a convivial place and useful activities where each participant could find a direct benefit for herself or himself. While indirectly addressing poverty issues, it sought to have a wider impact on residents’ lives, using food-related activities to create commensality, share moments, empower, enable socialisation, develop skills, and support access to the job market. As such, the activities ranging from urban farming to cooking workshops, as well as food events, video-making, food distribution, job search and entrepreneurship, have supported those in need as well as those accompanying those in needs.

The other key aspect of the project has been the use of temporary experimentation to start rolling out a prototype of the project on a temporary location, L’Avant-goût, launched in September 2017. The initial and immediate objectives of L’Avant-goût were defined to: allow residents and stakeholders to get to know the future project;  provide local NGOs and residents with facilities and material to cook, produce and process food; provide all inhabitants with an open space for social activities several days a week; develop a regulatory framework adapted to the objectives of the project (user manual, hygiene and safety rules, etc.); and develop consensus among inhabitants and stakeholders when it comes to make decisions about the functioning and use of L’Avant-goût. More than a focus on the Community Kitchen, L’Avant-goût became a test bed for the whole project, experimenting its location, co-creation model, governance, activities, emergence of an integrated ecosystem and visibility to its audiences. More details on the learnings from these experiences are shared in the UIA article as well as scattered throughout this journal.

Obviously, similarly to the rest of society and the world, the project has been affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. At the time of writing, in November 2020, the pandemic has been prominent in France for 9 months. The second wave had just arrived. Adjustments had to be made. Half joking, Hervé Hazard from Les Sens du Goût stated “we don’t project ourselves, it is over”. Even if he did not truly believe what he said, he meant that the future is changing everyday. The project and partners have had to readjust themselves constantly: new rules, new risks, new limitations. Just at the time of this Journal’s interviews, November 2020, a whole part of the team had been quarantined as one of the team members happened to have been tested positive: one after one, almost all the other partners discovered they had been infected as well. The second lock down led to the closure of L’Avant-goût, with a yet unknown date for reopening. It has also impacted the opening of Chaud Bouillon! and on its business model (see below).

The partners do not take it as a fatality. It is a fact. A new reality within which their project-related activities as well other daily work needs to go on. Learnings are continuous. This Journal will reflect some of them at a given time, bearing in mind that by the time the last Journal is written there will have been many more.

So, what has happened in the TAST’in FIVES project in three years? Where are we now and what is envisaged for the last months of the project?[1] Without any doubt, the flagship and most visible part of the work – centralising most of the activities – has been the deployment of L’Avant-goût. During this period the partners carried out almost all their planned activities and are now programing the after UIA phase, in the form of Chaud Bouillon!.

L’Avant-goût was developed as the temporary location for the future building which will host an innovative combination of activities in the fields of social integration, urban agriculture, production, food processing and catering. The prefiguration place is big enough to accommodate several (1180 sqm) components of the future project: a bungalow hosting the community kitchen, a dining room and on an outdoor terrace (110 sqm); a container hosting a forerunner of the urban farming demonstrator (45 sqm); a bungalow hosting the UIA partners who will play a key role in running the site (30 sqm); and green spaces.[1]

L’Avant-goût has also supported the reinforcement of complementarity and synergies between the different existing local activities, driving social integration in the neighbourhood.  Partners developed a governance model, to ensure all partners could benefit successfully from the place. The site also hosted Summer ephemerous street food market, “La Friche Gourmande” (see the 2nd Journal and article on Testing a future Food Court by prototyping it in real-life) and dedicated communication campaign,

which made it possible to objectify and confirm the commerciality potential of the place on a metropolitan scale.

Over three years, the activities organised at L’Avant-goût have been embraced four pillars: inclusion, solidarity, transmission – and professional reinsertion, and food. The key objectives and figures of these can be summarised as:

Urban farming

Yncréa Hauts-de-France has been responsible to make urban agriculture possible at L’Avant-goût by ensuring food producing, carrying out pedagogical activities and exchange of learning with inhabitants from the neighbourhood and the public of participating NGOs (homeless people, in need of social relations, young children, local schools, etc.). It has for example organised workshops around urban agriculture, such as “a garden in a bottle”, plant cuttings barter, “cook the vegetable garden” on insects, herbs, endives, and wild plants. It has also facilitated participatory works while launching hydroponics and the endive garden, building the seed bank, building the chicken coop.

Cooking workshops

Le Secours Populaire Français, Les Sens du Goût, La Sauvegarde du Nord and the CCAS have led a series of workshops with each of their target audience (Precarious public, migrants, homeless, far from labour market, socially excluded and isolated people, elderly people, inhabitants from the neighbourhood or local pupils) as well as together, seeking to cover a variety of objectives:

• Readjusting food budget;
• Creating social ties;
• Making people autonomous;
• Valorising cultures;
• Creating a safe space for exchange;
• Reflecting about well eating; and.
• Fighting against climate change (using food surplus)

Just to mention a few examples of the plethora of workshops, some, organised by Les Sens du Goût have been based on recipes organised by a volunteer or a participant, so-called “Chef d’un jour” (“cook of the day”), others, dedicated to precarious public by Secours Populaire Français, have provided the opportunity for them to eat a meal.

Public events

The partners have also organised several events for the general public around food to raise awareness about the meaning of food (FestiSens), sustainable food (“On mangera quoi dans 20 ans?”- “What will we eat in 20 years?), as well as sharing refugee’s culinary tradition with a wider audience (“Refugee food Festival”).

Training for professionals

Trainings have been organised for professionals on cooking and awareness raising activities around food. Some partners themselves have had to develop new working methodologies with food as an entry point (see article Food-related activities as a leverage against urban poverty).

Video-making

Cinemas and films have also been used to empower children and create a sense of community in the neighbourhood. Film projections with a cooking workshop and discussion have been organised as “ciné soupe”. Some documentaries have been for example made during the “Apéro sans frontières” (“Aperitive without borders”) for participants to share their cultures. Stop motion have been created with children, short video recipes and documentaries about the neighbourhood as well.

Food Distribution

With regards to the precarity of the target group of some of the partners, food distributions have been organised. A solidarity fridge was installed outside L’Avant-goût and food has been shared at the end of the cooking workshop – sometime the reason for people to join.

Employment

Activities around job search have also been organised to discover working options in the fields of catering, agriculture, urban farming, as well as food processing. Matchmaking activities between employers and job seekers have also taken place. Specific support has been provided for job seekers in their search and guides have been developed. Entrepreneurship has also been supported by a specific incubator. These activities have been organised jointly with other partners, such as, amongst others, the Maison de l’Emploi de Lille, Lomme, Hellemmes, the “Territoire zero chômeurs”, the economic department of the City of Lille and of the Lille Metropole.

The project of the future Food Court, beyond its prototyping and testing directly by partners and their beneficiaries, has taken the form of a co-creation with all of them. In particular, a series of workshops has been carried out to identify the needs and wishes for the place (e.g. in terms of design, usage, etc.). For this, a Users’ Committee had been set up with monthly meetings and participatory workshops. The participants are volunteers who expressed interest in contributing to this process after having taken part in some initial activities of L’Avant-goût. These inputs have fed directly into the conceptualisation of Chaud Bouillon!.

During July 2020, and before the final location would be finished, Petite Lune, the future responsible for the Food Court, organised “L’Avant-goût de Chaud Bouillon!”. Partners were all impatient to have the project eventually launched and Petite Lune was eager to show its actual practice, beyond the theory it had shared during half a year. It was also the occasion to bring in some life to the neighbourhood after the first pandemic lock down and making the project real as Sarah Quelard, from Petite Lune, shared: “We have been able to finally work with the partners during L’Avant-goût de Chaud Bouillon! : it has been great to get to know each other, help each other for putting it together and to make it useful for our respective target groups. Eventually, this is happening.” During one month, the site hosted food corners and artistic activities such as improvisation games, fire breathers or wellness workshops. Over 300 people a day - over 4 days a week - visited the site, mostly families. Beneficiaries from the workshops also stayed on the site: as opposed to the previous temporary summer editions of Friche Gourmande, they could easily stay and enjoy the tables without consuming. Being seated provided a safe space within a wider environment. Unfortunately, the sanitary situation forced to interrupt the summer season.

The future site of TAST’in FIVES has now been named “Chaud Bouillon!”. It will propose a systemic approach to food: training, production, distribution, workshops, restaurant and events. It aims to become the local reference for food transition for residents, professionals, people far from the labour market, children, those seeking their career paths, enterprises. The main value of the project will be: well-being, inclusion, social entrepreneurship, education, social ties, solidarity and sustainable food. It will address these via four types of activities: a food court, a Common kitchen, a Professional kitchen, and an Urban Farm.

Food court

Common Kitchen

Professional Kitchen

Urban farm

Innovation is key for Urban Innovative Actions projects. The City of Lille did not wait for UIA to become available to start its innovation but used it as a leverage to further testing it and implementing it. This becomes clear in light of the way a project-based approach is integrated in the City of Lille, the way the multi-level governance is taking place between neighbourhood-city-metropolitan area levels and in light of the after UIA period.

As was detailed in the previous journals, the governance model is complex and seeks to ensure a proper co-creation, as well as learning and exchange between all the partners, the main tool for this being the monthly COPART were all partners meet and which provide a space for talking. Overall, the project partners welcome this approach which ensures the smooth running of this project: partners’ coordination, actions follow-up, financial and administrative support, reframing of the project, selection of those in charge of the eventual food court etc. Partners also welcome the City as a guarantor of the implementation of the tasks. At the same time, especially towards the end of the project, the partners remaining in Chaud Bouillon! are consolidating themselves as an entity (see section 4.3) and are becoming more autonomous.

The project has had to face the Covid-19 pandemic, the municipal election period in May 2020 and post municipal changes in the municipality, as well as the departure of the project coordinator. Yet, they still feel supported.

The “local authority” is represented by different levels of local governance, each in their own respect, at the same time as complementing strongly the other ones. It is important to note that in this project, the Municipality of Lille is the project coordinator, whereas the municipal social action center (CCAS), which is part of the Municipality, is a partner. The project can also count on the European Metropolis of Lille, which supports Chaud Bouillon ! strongly, integrates it to the Territorial Food Plan (PAT), and provides support, particularly in terms of economic development and creation of third places

The last year has shown some strong learnings and follow-up from partners embracing the future governance in a collective intelligence and truly participatory way. On 19 December 2019, the project organised a COPART to introduce the organisation in charge of the future Food Court, Petite Lune. Bearing in mind the UIA project would cease on the end of 2020, how should partners go about this new afterlife?

To initiate discussions and support partners, including Petite Lune as an economic operator, two online workshops were organised, moderated by the UIA expert. On 5 May 2020, partners met to share their values and stakes for the project as well as governance issues they would like to cover. This led to the drafting of a roadmap. On 10 June 2020 they met to exchange on the governance modalities, drafting a charter. A list of topics to be covered and initial responsibilities for coordinating the work on these topics was drafted. In particular, the partners agreed to work together on a charter and CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) policy, mutualisation of the management and services, co-constructed programming of activities, joint communication, reflexions upon a specific legal structure.

Early September 2020, the involved partners self-organised themselves and agreed to carry out this work in the form of working groups on issues such as communication, management of common areas, access to the site, signposting, project funding, and privatisation of the site. Reflexions about the creation of a structure (NGO, cooperative, etc.) to be responsible for the trademark have also be launched.

The last two years of the project have been dense, and everyday has brought in some new learnings for the project partners. The project partners have truly felt the usefulness of L’Avant-goût, as Elodie Tison from les Rencontres Audiovisuelles shared that “when filming the different cooking workshops, I could really see to which extent L’Avant-goût was a vector for social link and enabled isolated people to be part of a group and investing themselves in a local dynamic. Another highlight has been pedagogy as the workshops have enabled showing and discovering other ways of cooking, eating, living, being”.

The project keeps on being strongly supported by the elected representatives of the City of Lille: the mayor, Martine Aubry, was present at the launch of the project on 30 September 2017. Political continuity after the municipal elections of spring 2020 can only ensure a fertile ground for further support. Also, the project is embedded in the wider urban innovation vision which the city wants to take further: TAST’in FIVES was one of the projects selected by brainstorming within the municipality to develop urban innovation and trigger a project-based approach. And this will not stop at the end of the UIA project: the municipality seeks to ensure that the after UIA, Chaud Bouillon! will continue. The City of Lille will not play the role of coordinator anymore but will be present in its own remits. This can be currently exemplified by the fact that the original project coordinator, Antoine Plane, left the position but has been replaced by another dedicated coordinator, Cécilie Dagmey[1].

One of the key highlights has been to bring together people, beneficiaries and partners, with a strong variety of profiles, to work together on a common project.  Exchanges and partnerships have been rich. Beyond the core 14 partners, other partners have been included along the process for more ad hoc activities (e.g. La Cloche, Centre Social Roger Salengro, Cuist’home & Cookin Movie, … ). The profiles have ranged from public sector to the NGOs via academia, social, food up to building and construction sectors. All the partners have been motivated and dedicated and the work on the after UIA governance model can only prove it. Such collaboration has enabled identifying solutions to on-going constraints such as mobilising the public making L’Avant-goût understandable, testing a living the concept… Solutions were found and implemented collectively. As Alix Réquillart, responsible for the urban farm, underlined: « the involvement of each of us makes our project radiate”.  Partners have remained solidary in light of the on-going pandemic-related changes.

The inclusion of an extra key partner from the private sector, Petite Lune, selected to be responsible for the future Food Court, show the strong potential for future such collaborations in City-led projects and the added value of mixing the profiles of partners. Indeed, Petite Lune, not being under UIA and being strongly affected financially by the delays and the pandemic, is yet seeking to pursue its opportunity to be active on a fixed site for 12 years throughout the whole year[1].

The partners have welcomed the flexibility at heart of the project. At the level of the partners, they have showed openness, goodwill, wish and ability to co-created innovative solutions when need has been, with engagement and enthusiasm. At the level of the project which has had to evolve constantly and in particular on the light of the Covid-19 crisis and the regularly updated sanitary measures. Finally, at the level of UIA, partners have welcome readjustments which have been possible in budget lines with unforeseen needs (for example for the public procurement for the green house, see 6.3), as well for the overall extension of the project because of the Covid-19 pandemic. For example:

• During the first lock-down, L’Avant-goût was totally closed before re-opening in a reduced way in a warm spirit enabling dialogue. Social media helped maintaining the link.
• The catering sector has been strongly affected and fewer job opportunities are available: A specific support is now provided for job seekers, notably in the sector of care
• The future of the Future Court has been impacted, as the whole catering sector, and solutions are currently being sought to make it more versatile (e.g. takeaway option, sale of raw and transformed products, etc).

The previous sections have shown some initial learnings and highlights of the project, together with issues it has faced and addressed. This section goes further into some more specifically UIA-project related challenges.

In terms of administrative following of the KPIs, the partners all monitored their activities closely in order to ensure they would reach out their planned outputs: for example, the numbers of occurrences of workshops and events as well as the number of participants.

One of the partners, MESHS (European Center for the Humanities and Social Sciences), was also tasked with the evaluation of TAST’in FIVES experimentation. The collective and pluridisciplinary research analysed the way residents of their neighbourhoods of Fives and Hellemmes grasped the Common Kitchen for over more than two years. It also addressed the way this project would contribute to improving their “well-being”[1].  The research first of all carried out carried out, an on-going evaluation of the project. It used a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods, to assess the actions undertaken within l’Avant-goût: this was done within the realm of social (cultural, food-related and sport-related) dynamics in the neighbourhood in order to better understand the grasp of the Common kitchen by the residents and suggesting ways of improving it. It also sets up the basis for ex-post evaluation with the co-design of indicators with all the partners. The pandemics stopped their development. This work will need to be continued outside UIA and implemented in the project by the partners remaining at Chaud Bouillon!.

Finally, the City of Lille and the CCAS also carried an analysis of the profile and interest of participant to the activities carried out within L’Avant-goût, over one month in Summer 2019: volunteer participants were asked to complete a questionnaire on a tablet or on paper to identify the profiles of participants, the ways they learnt about the place, their motivation to take part in these activities, their perceptions and expectations for the future. This approach is planned to be followed-up within Chaud Bouillon!, as Petit Lune stressed it would ensure a close monitoring of visitors, especially those from the neighbourhood and to adjust strategies if need is. Yet, the partners would need to develop an adequate structure in their governance model to ensure the uptake of such an approach.

La Friche Gourmande has been a success during the Summers of 2018 and 2019 thanks to the marketing capabilities of the organisers: they prove to be more efficient at it than the Municipality.

Yet, for “L’Avant-goût de Chaud Bouillon! », in Summer 2020, with the limited duration of the planned edition, Petite Lune did not have the resources to develop a full communication campaign. As it was prevented from communicating about before its start, its communication remained limited to social media and during the duration of the activities. All in all, the cost benefit analysis of the first month (including the low turnover and bad weather) and the realisation that indeed, their events were out of bearable noise levels for the neighbourhood (out of an independent study) made Petite Lune decide not to continue in August and focus on the opening of the final site.

At the moment, and in light of the possibility to engage in “regular” activities after the Covid-19 pandemic, the project is envisaging to create almost 80 FTE. In particular, 10 would be hired as part of their professional reinsertion scheme, 6 civic services, 16 indirect jobs would be created, and more than 150 partners would take part in the project.

This is based on the assumption that the site would attract 200 000 visitors a year, that 150 events and shows would be organised as well as over 600 workshops and more than 22 trainings. 75000 meals would also be served. From the entrepreneurial side, 50 project holders would be support out of which 10 would be incubated, preparing more than 20 000.

Chaud Bouillon! would work on the basis of a hybrid economic model, using the original 6 million-euros investment (5 millions euros from UIA). In 2022, the annual functioning budget would be 2 971 000 €, public and private support - 309 000 euros and own resources: 2 662 000 euros.

Reflexions are also currently going on about the structure which will embody the common activities and governance (as well as coordination) of Chaud Bouillon! Notwithstanding the development of the work on governance (see section 4.3), partners do acknowledge that for 3 years they have a (very good) coordinator which supported their processes. Now, it is unclear if the governance should be totally collaborative and/or in the frame of a cooperative. Partners are seeking expertise to support them in their choice.

In parallel, the Urban Farm also has to design its best structure enabling a sustainable business model yet in accordance with its economic and social values.

Officially, the TAST’in FIVES project closed in December 2020. What remains to be finalised and which will continue in the months following the closure is mostly the operationalisation of the governance. At the same time, the partners will need to develop a risk mitigation plan and new scenarios in light of the potential continuation of the Covid-19 pandemic, at different possible pace.

In the upcoming weeks, the priority will be to secure the involvement of petite Lune in Chaud Bouillon!, notably while designing the most relevant juridical structure for Chaud Bouillon! The Urban Farm will also be led by the recently set up “Lilotopia”[1] – which will require to further defined is legal framework and business model. Finally, the City of Lille will also need to quickly define its positioning and future involvement in Chaud Bouillon!.

I would like to thank all the partners for their inputs, reflections and sharing of experiences on the past and prospects of the project, especially in these tricky times.