Our work
Food systems innovation
Holistically, collectively, for impact
We are specialists in designing the enabling environments needed to support agrifood innovation ecosystems. Building on our knoweldge and experience of what works, we pioneer new, innovative approaches which go further to address the huge challenges we are facing.
Explore some of the main areas we focus on in the sections below, and get in touch if you are interested in finding out more about how to work with us.
Structures
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Successful innovation ecosystems are much more than a collection of organisations, centred around one specific point of the innovation cycle. Often, we see funding or support directed at advancing innovation from one stage to the next – for instance a focus on commercialisation from research institutions, or support for startups to scale through accelerators, or funding for open innovation challenges. These are important elements, but when they aren’t joined up or co-ordinated collectively, they can create bottlenecks.
This is because ideas don’t become solutions overnight; they involve a whole host of different types of organisations, and they require different types of support at different points in time. Innovation needs an enabling environment to thrive.
Examples of high-performing innovation ecosystems all over the world are two things: firstly, they are sector or challenge-specific multistakeholder communities, reflecting the complexity of the system they operate in and are built around shared ownership; secondly, their enabling environment supports (to different degrees) three different interconnected elements - Education, Innovation and Entrepreneurship. All three of these elements are important in ensuring a continual innovation pipeline, enabling curation of innovation mindset and entrepreneurial skills to development of ideas and concepts, testing, commercialisation and scaling, and supported open innovation collaboration. The Education pillar supports life-long learning and skills development, instilling an innovation and entrepreneurial mindset, as well as ensuring we have the right skills within the workforce to support the system as it develops. The Innovation pillar connects and supports open innovation between different types of organisations, de-risking collaborations as well as providing safe spaces for pre-competitive collaborative innovation which helps to shift the system in a way which benefits all parties. The Entrepreneurship pillar provides support to startups and scaleups from idea to market, with different support needed at different points in the lifecycle of the organisation. In Europe, this ‘Knowledge Triangle’ approach has been pioneered and well documented by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology. It varies from community to community (sector) in the way that it is expressed, but it provides a solid basis for supporting innovation ecosystems. It is this approach we have experience in and take inspiration from.
Infrastructure that co-ordinates the connections between these pillars of the triangle and the multistakeholder community surrounding them, ensures innovation can continually move through the pipeline – reducing bottlenecks, whilst enhancing the efficiency and impact of both interventions and investments.
Purpose is important to consider too. Innovation helps us to solve the challenges we face (both big and small), to drive progress and bring value. Humans are inherently innovative, our curiosity and desire for new knowledge and to solve problems has meant we have traversed continents, oceans and space to discover more and to develop further. Innovation ecosystems focussed on food can collectively invest and concentrate effort in different challenges facing the food system. If they are designed well, they can be both united under an overall purpose or goal, and agile to emerging challenges and enhance.
Our knowledge and experience in this area, as well as our strong international network means we advise different types of organisations (including government, private and NGO) on food innovation ecosystems globally. This includes developments of strategies and plans, as well as connecting the dots to bring the right partners to the table for shared purpose.
Blog article: Investing in people
Blog article: We have fallen out of love with innovation
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If your inspiration for innovation only comes from looking at what is happening in your own back yard, then you are missing a trick. Different perspectives and expertise will help us to move further and faster and unlock our innovation potential.
The Global innovation highway is a concept Lucy developed on the observation that innovation communities and ecosystems are often very focussed on looking inwards, and there is little financial and institutional support to look outwards. Just like the way food systems and their challenges can't be put in neat boxes respecting borders, if innovation is going to provide the solutions we need, we must think about how we can enable innovation across international borders.
The Global Innovation Highway uses the principle of building two-way routes to support the flow of innovation between different innovation ecosystems. It supports the exchange of tech, talent and capital between different geographic regions.
A road used only one way eventually fails: the exit ramp feels lucky, the on-ramp feels exploited, and trust erodes. Two-way movement shifts the model from one where we “export solutions” for short term gain to governed, strategic exchanges where each ecosystem contributes, learns and benefits long term.
This reciprocal flow is beneficial to both sides, is built on trust and respect, and deliberately non-extractive.
However, Innovation Highways do not exist until someone starts to build them. At Liminal Thinking, working with our network in high-performing and rapidly developing food innovation ecosystems globally, we have the skills and network to build and open the route, determine who travels it first, and create the strategy for maintenance of the relationship surface. We have specific expertise and direct links into food innovation ecosystems in Europe, Canada, the Gulf, ASEAN and Japan, and we are actively working to build the foundations for the Global Innovation Highway between them.
We can’t do this alone though; we need the right partners.
If you want to explore the wheres, whys and hows of connecting your innovation ecosystem with another, then get in touch.
Blog Article: Innovation Highways: Building Global Routes to a Better Food System
Blog Article: Loading a regenerative mindset… a postcard from Japan
People
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We deserve better than rehearsed soulless panels and keynotes given in echo chambers.
How often have you been somewhere where action and real change is promised, but you end up in another sterile conference or meeting room with the same group of people, saying the same things they always do?
We might bring people together to discuss innovation, but where is the innovation in these engagement spaces? How do we help people to immerse, experience, feel, and us this to change the system?
Bringing creativity, multisensory immersion and a different perspective to convening, sharing and networking spaces, our work on innovative engagement is through the tmrw project in collaboration with Redrock Productions.
If you are totally bored of panels and interested in reimagining the events or experiences you create, then get in touch.
Blog Article: In this room everyone is waiting to talk
LI Post: In Memoriam for the Food System
Blog Article: Funeral for the Food System Chapter 1: Seeking sustenance
Blog Article: Funeral for the Food System Chapter 2: Sticky relationships
Blog Article: Funeral for the Food System Chapter 3: Half-truths and false economies
Blog Article: Epilogue: The Eulogy that was never given but not lost
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When you think of conflict, the food system probably isn’t the first thing that comes to mind, but our food system is becoming increasingly polarised. In many cases, we are all working towards positive systems change, but challenges around finite resources, different belief systems and power inequalities mean that we spend increased time, effort and resources arguing about who is right, rather than moving forwards. Although we should not leave harmful practices unchecked or unchallenged, there are a number of situations where depolarisation could be really helpful: recognising that we don’t need to agree on everything and accepting there will be many solutions to the complex challenges we face.
At Liminal Thinking we have experience of working as independent convenors in polarised spaces, and of finding ways to bring people together in a constructive way around areas of shared interest. We do this with empathy and objectivity through a process of trust building, deepening respect and increasing understanding of different perspectives. Examples of work we have done in this space include bridge-building between the plant-based and regenerative movements, and between diverse multistakeholder communities to develop shared programming and policy messaging at the UNFCCC COP in the Action on Food Hub (formally Food Systems Pavillion).
Blog Article: Power and polarisation – black and white, or many shades of grey?
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The ways in which we work, interact and make decisions have a huge influence on our food system. This work began as an exploration of regeneration and professional development and has developed into a deep interest into how you could instil this within organisational practices and business culture.
We believe in the positive power of regenerative ways of working and interacting with others, ensuring principles such as systems thinking, reciprocity, adaptability and stewardship are embedded into our approaches. We work closely with the Conscious Food Systems Alliance, and are part of a number of multistakeholder working groups which explore the use of inner development for outer change collectively, within organisations.
Blog Article: Consciousness in organisations: an image problem, severance and an obsession with immortality