Decision Support Tools

Banner of Menu of Action Icons

The Modeling the Future of Food in Your Neighborhood study (foodNEST 2.0) provides trustworthy and practical decision-making tools. These decision support tools use a systems lens within an equity framework to guide community-driven food systems change.  

These tools are intended to be used by community leaders, residents, food retailers, community leaders, and elected officials working to mobilize actions that lead to community food security. They are available for download below.  

The Menu of Actions is one of several tools developed by the foodNEST 2.0 collaborative to mobilize community driven food systems change. Our work is iterative and adaptive and always open for deliberation and evolution, which aligns with our collective belief that transformation is a living process. 

Click here to download the foodNEST 2.0 Menu of Actions Executive Summary.

Click here to download the foodNEST 2.0 Menu of Actions.

 

Download the foodNEST 2.0 Menu of Actions

The food system we hope for can serve to achieve justice where people and communities have freedom, agency, and dignity to be authentic with their food traditions. Beginning in 2015, food retail assessments were conducted annually in grocery stores, corner stores, pharmacies, and dollar stores located in four Ohio neighborhoods - three in Cleveland and one in Columbus. Food store assessments were used to systematically examine food availability, pricing, variety, and quality.

Read Healthy Food Availability in Four Ohio Neighborhoods: Findings from Nutrition Environment Measures Surveys, 2015 - 2019

The Food Systems Change Vision Board toolkit and accompanying fillable vision board serve multiple purposes that, as a whole, provide insights that inform a transformation proposition to tip the food system towards fairness. 

Users of the Vision Board toolkit will find this pair of tools valuable in taking an idea from the ideation phase to a distinct vision of change that can be shared broadly leading to the implementation phase of an idea.