Rourkela: The Rourkela Smart City Limited (RSCL) has won the Milan Pact Awards 2022. The RMC was adjudged the best among a large number of participating cities from around the world, in the Social & Economic Equity category, with its practice ‘E-Cool Mandi’.
Rourkela was awarded during the 8th MUFPP (Milan Urban Food Policy Pact) Global Forum in Rio de Janeiro, scheduled from October 17 to 19, under the theme ‘Food to Feed the Climate Justice: urban food solutions for a fairer world’.
Food Safety Officer, Rourkela Municipal Corporation, Swagatika Behera received the award at Rio de Janeiro on Monday.
The winners in other categories are as listed below:
Governance: New York, USA – A New York framework for buying good food;
Sustainable Diets and Nutrition: Addis Ababa, Ethiopia – Addis Ababa School Feeding Program;
Social and Economic Equity: Rourkela, India – E-Cool Mandi;
Food production: Rosario, Argentina – Agroecological food production in Rosario;
Food Supply and Distribution: Yeosu, South Korea – Strategy to secure our talents and small farms;
Food Waste: London, England – London Food Waste Reduction Program.
It may be noted that in this year’s edition of the Milan Pact Awards,133 cities submitted 251 practices, making it the most participated edition ever. During the event, the winners will gather for a round table discussion to share their accomplishments and challenges with the MUFPP signatory cities.
“By reading the best practices, we understood that cities can be great testbeds for many innovative projects that tackle poor diets, provide decent jobs, reduce carbon emissions, support local farmers and communities, adopt creative approaches to urban agriculture, improve children’s health through the integration of plant-based solutions in the school meal, use the Covid pandemic to move towards more systemic interventions and much more,” the organisers of the event stated in a congratulatory mail to the RMC.
The Rourkela Municipal Corporation (RMC) launched a cold storage project with an aim to ensure sustainable income for women vegetable vendors by checking distress sale and cutting down waste. The project envisaged to provide around 700 street vendors selling vegetables and fruits, mostly women, with solar-power cold storage units to reduce waste and electric vehicles for distribution.
Vegetables are perishable goods and local vendors and farmers sell around 30 per cent of their unsold stock at throwaway prices fearing damage. The safe storage would prevent wastage and eventually enhance their earning,
Worth mentioning, the 8th Milan Urban Food Policy Pact Global Forum, to be held by the city of Rio de Janeiro, aims at exploring further the themes of sustainable development, putting food systems at the center of its agenda.
“Cities and governments are pivotal to promote job creation and income generation through sustainable and inclusive food systems, while respecting the environment and workers’ rights, supporting local products, healthier and affordable diets and lowering food waste,” MUFPP further stated.
