How does change really happen? 5 things we’ve learnt from our research on food systems actions  

Changing food systems is something we care deeply about: ensuring healthy diets, dignified livelihoods, resilient ecosystems, and fairer markets. Yet, shifting these systems is rarely straightforward. Over the past months, a collective of African Food Fellowship fellows, facilitators and researchers worked together to explore how change actually unfolds when people experiment in real-life contexts. We have compiled our insights into a report which you can read here. Below are five things we’ve learnt about how change really happens.

1. Change begins when we can see ourselves in the system

Through systems mapping workshops, we placed ourselves inside the picture of the challenges we want to address. This was a powerful moment. It helped us move from feeling like isolated actors to recognising that we are already part of interconnected, dynamic networks of farmers, traders, teachers, students, policymakers and communities. Seeing ourselves in the system made the system changeable.

2. Mapping is not enough. Experimentation and action is where momentum starts

Systems maps helped us understand the dynamics. But nothing shifted until we turned those insights into small, doable experiments in our everyday work. Planting school food gardens. Testing spirulina products in new markets. Exploring ways to connect storage, finance and farmer training to reduce post-harvest loss.

3. Coordination matters more than collaboration

We initially assumed that systems change meant working closely together all the time. Instead, we discovered something else: we don’t need to collaborate constantly, we need to coordinate. Knowing what others are doing, aligning intentions, and moving in the same direction, even while working in different places and networks, was far more important than forcing joint activities or working together ‘by any means’.

4. Change often emerges in unexpected ways

Some outcomes surprised us. A school garden project sparked ideas for a youth-led agri-innovation incubator. A spirulina awareness campaign opened new nutritional and commercial networks. Meanwhile, other efforts progressed more slowly, reminding us that local context, time and trust shape the pace of change. Systems change is not linear, it unfolds, adapts and branches out.

5. Changing the system also changes us

As we experiment and learn together, we began to question and reshape our own professional identities. Teacher–gardener, entrepreneur–activist, researcher–facilitator. Systems change calls us to cross our professional boundaries, take risks, and re-imagining our roles in the interconnected systems we operate.