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Food Foresight

Food Foresight is an annual collaboration between Nuffer, Smith, Tucker and the California Institute of Food and Agricultural Research at University of California, Davis, designed to offer those in production agriculture, consumer food products and other aspects of the agri-food chain guidance on the issues and trends shaping their world. The barrage of issues can be overwhelming:

  • Finite natural resources (water, soil, air, habitat)
  • Adequate labor supply
  • Genetically modified organisms
  • New technologies disrupting production
  • Shifts in consumer food preferences
  • Retailer pressures
  • Sustainability
  • Climate change
  • Invasive species, pests and diseases
  • Food safety
  • Increasing division between “local” and “corporate”

It’s very easy to get distracted and seduced into allocating limited resources to the wrong areas or to pathways that aren’t strategic to your success over the long haul. The Food Foresight system is designed to give partners the tools to shape how change unfolds. That is, putting resources behind accelerating opportunities, redirecting threats and/or making internal adjustments to manage change.

Months of gathering data and observing media coverage on dozens of topic areas are followed by an in-person, three-day meeting with a blue ribbon panel of multi-disciplinary experts. The resulting discussion guides the creation of the annual Food Foresight report, which is shared exclusively with members for their companies to use as an internal tool for strategic planning.

Could your organization benefit from such strategic forecasting? Contact us to become a member or to discuss how we can customize the Food Foresight process to fit your industry, product or company.