In 2021, FoodCloud commissioned the More Than Food report with the help of funding from the Community Foundation of Ireland, which highlighted many challenges faced by communities delivering food projects including high costs and resource deficits. The report identified a need for greater connectivity and knowledge sharing across our own community network, to capture and replicate best practice, and that greater investment in this area would increase the understanding of the role of foodsharing in climate action and would build organisational and individual capacity to maximise the potential of surplus food.  This report provided the basis for a new project over the last 3 years, called ‘Thrive Together’ funded under the Community Climate Action Programme Strand 2 - which finishes up this month . 

Fast forward to 2025, ‘Thrive Together’ aimed at increasing awareness and engagement with food sharing in communities and has been far reaching.

We created:

• 1 Toolkit of resources to support the development of food sharing initiatives

• 7 Video Case Studies to showcase the positive impact of food sharing
• 2 Massive Open Online Courses with ATU
• 7 Events and workshops to engage communities
• 1 Food Waste in the Home Course for communities to take and deliver locally

See all links to available resources Here

We connected by;

• Partnering with 7 Local Development Companies to deliver workshops and events.
• Engaging over 700 individuals on the problem of food waste and opportunity of food redistribution - through courses and workshops.
• Providing Case Study Videos and capacity building webinars receiving over 6200 views online
• Leading 20 workshops and events (Most recently in Wexford)

Recognising the centrality of Community to our work

As this Community Climate Action Programme funded project comes to an end,  we are reflecting a lot on what we have learned over the past 3 years that will inform how we move forward towards 2030 and our goal of redistributing 1 Billion meals.  Foodsharing, the practice of sharing food rather than wasting it,  is enabled across Ireland by the surplus food supply that the FoodCloud systems have unlocked - but it is our incredible network of charities and community groups that take that food supply and transform it into something very special indeed.  

But, like a lot of community work, sharing food is not as simple as it sounds and comes with many challenges and costs. Building on learnings from the Community Climate Action Programme funded ‘Thrive Together’, and our recent Food Circle research project which looked at the challenges faced by communities (due to be published late 2025), we have designed a community engagement plan from 2026-30 that recognises our role in supporting communities to overcome the barriers to sharing food. 

Building on what we have learned over the last 3 years through direct engagement with our community partners,  we are more aware than ever that communities need sustained support, via education and networking (which the Community Climate Action Programme has helped us to start) - but also through sustained funding, stronger local coordination, and greater support for innovative projects that promote social inclusion and provide wrap-around services such as social supermarkets.

Looking to the Future

As we close out the Community Climate Action Programme and look ahead to 2030, our ambitious goals - including redistributing 1 billion meals and contributing to global climate goals - we have developed four key commitments informed by the lessons and insights gained over the past four years.

• We will play our part in building thriving local networks of local and interconnected community partners, delivering  inclusive new models of sharing food.
• We acknowledge the sustainability of food sharing projects is key to achieving 2030 goals.  We will continue to support community partners through improved service delivery, relationship-building opportunities and educational resources.
• We will elevate the voice and role of community partners across public discourse, because foodsharing is a positive story, worth telling. In Ireland the idea of the meitheal reverberates in the work of our community partners,  who use food to connect with people for personal and community wellbeing. They remind us everyday that food is a human right and that nobody should feel ashamed of receiving food rather than seeing it wasted. 

We will advocate for Foodsharing as a legitimate and powerful pathway to broader social impact, that cannot happen without emotional, physical and financial support. It is necessary to influence policy so that community perspectives and food are recognised as a key practice in social inclusion policies.