Behaviourally-Informed Food Policies: Models, Concepts and Some Evidence

The food system is hit hard by many old and new crises – climate, biodiversity, conflicts or land use, supply chain disruption and food poverty, weaponization of food, and obesity and malnutrition, often within the same country. Our current food production and consumption patterns contribute to these crises; however, they also hold potential solutions for mitigation and improvement. Behavioural insights (BI) are increasingly used to make food policies more effective and to promote more sustainable food patterns. While BI-based policies traditionally focus on the micro and group level for change, consumer behaviour models have always conceptualized behaviour change as embedded in socio-ecological systems and account for context-dependency. The talk first sketches the contours of a behaviourally-informed food policy aiming for more resilient and sustainable food systems. It then presents five recent and ongoing empirical behavioural studies on how to induce change for more sustainable food patterns.   

Meet our speaker and chair

Professor Lucia A. Reisch is the Inaugural El-Erian Professor for Behavioural Economics and Policy at the University of Cambridge and Director of the El-Erian Institute of Behavioural Economics and Policy for Sustainable Development at Cambridge Judge Business School. She is also a Professorial Fellow of Queens’ College. Lucia is trained as a behavioural economist with a PhD in economics and social sciences and is one of Europe’s leading academic experts in behavioural insights-based policies for sustainability. She is an Editor of the Journal of Consumer Policy (SpringerNature), a founding Editorial Board Member of the journal Behavioural Public Policy, and an Editorial Board member of Food Policy.

Dr Adam Oliver (@1969ajo) teaches behavioural economics and behavioural public policy, and has published widely in these areas, and indeed also in the areas of health economics and health policy. Adam Oliver is the Founding Editor of the journal Behavioural Public Policy, and author of ‘The Origins of Behavioural Public Policy’ (CUP, 2017), ‘Reciprocity and the Art of Behavioural Public Policy’ (CUP, 2019), and ‘A Political Economy of Behavioural Public Policy’ (CUP, 2023). He is the founder of the Annual International Behavioural Public Policy Conference, and the International Behavioural Public Policy Association.

More about this event

The Department of Social Policy (@LSESocialPolicy) provides top quality international and multidisciplinary research and teaching on social and public policy challenges facing countries across the world. From its foundation in 1912 it has carried out cutting edge research on core social problems and helped to develop policy solutions.