First of all, thank you for your gifts to Open Food Facts. We know times are difficult, so we particularly appreciate any support that we receive to continue our mission to inform consumers around the world about what they eat.
Here's a little look back at what Open Food Facts has accomplished as a community:
1. Talking about community ... it's the heart beat of this project !
Last year in October, we organised a big community get-together in Paris (made possible in big part thanks to the City of Paris that allowed us to use several of their meeting halls for free!). It's our annual Open Food Facts Days, time dedicated to connecting in person as members of the community, brainstorming and sharing meals.
Here's a look back at the 2022 Edition: This past October, we've had another wonderful community weekend, with many members from France and Europe ! Read dedicated article here & don't hesitate to join us next year :)
Other community activities involved various scan parties (participative workshops), imagining the future of our mobile app, and regular community calls.
We've been delighted to have more of Open Food Facts data reusers, apps such as El Coco, Horizon App, The New Sort, Speisekammer, MyLabel, who join the project as active contributors, often participating in brainstorms & discussions.
The more people we have onboard, the more impactful we’ll be on the food industry !
To promote the work of Open Food Facts, we’ve been to various professional fairs (SIAL in Paris, Cibus in Parma, Green Week in Berlin, Anuga in Koln, Salon de l’Agriculture) inviting food industry professionals to share their product data with us.
We’ve been grateful to also get media coverage & mentions (such as this article in the Guardian last September, or a TV mention by Pr. Mathilde Touvier) along with invitations to radio podcasts and conferences (such as the “Plastic packaging: can we go without them?” by Reporterre media). A significant effort has been made to improve our press kit & communications.
4. Keeping our Earth in mind
Open Food Facts continues to display the Eco-score (environmental footprint food score) for 730,000 products, even when it is not displayed on pack. The Eco-score is calculated based on the Agribalyse database and we make sure we are always up-to-date to display more accurate information. We are lucky to have amazing contributors, like John, to build together !
We also paired with the ADEME (French Agency for Ecological Transition) for a special operation “Tackling Food Packaging”. With new fields to collect packaging data added to Open Food Facts and the participation of hundreds of citizens and some producers, we’ve collected detailed packaging data on over 10k products, including weights. This data will serve to help articulate the future official environmental score and feed the reflection around more sustainable options for the future of food packaging.
5. Serving science with our data
We are proud to say that the Open Food Facts database is being used by numerous researchers around the world.
We are also delighted to have the support of Santé publique France (French Health Agency) to continue accompanying the expansion and evolution of the Nutri-Score (nutritional score).
6. Always improving technically
Open Food Facts is constantly looking at more efficient, smart ways to grow and better the database:
Open Food Facts has welcomed 7 interns who have trained in server, machine learning, partnerships and GDPR policy. They’ve been a tremendous help in the daily operations of the project.
Thanks to the Perl Foundation, Open Food Facts participated again in Outreachy (an open source internship program to promote diversity), with a project to improve the Producers Platform.
Moreover, Stéphane & Pierre gave a seminary (available here) at the prestigious Collège de France on “the potential to revolutionise future research and public health action in the field of nutrition and health: the example of Open Food Facts”.
Manon gave a lecture on Eco-Score to the students of Master CIPA (from design to industrialisation of food products) in Arras.
The year 2024 is bound to be as rich (if not more) !
So let’s look at what's on the menu 🍲
We are looking forward to ideas from our community, as well as presenting the Community Grants ! And thanks to our contributing translators, Open Food Facts continues to be available in more languages each year.
You can expect further exciting improvements on the mobile app, as well as a re-design of the search experience with Search-a-licious.
We will attempt to address the highly requested theme with Open Prices, the promising Open Products Facts, ingredient evaluation tool and many other impactful projects !
However, we need your support to continue leading change in the food industry.
You can join forces with Open Food Facts with your time, skills, contacts and monetary support. To make a gift, you can do it on Open Collective or on our donation page.
Let’s stand together & design the food landscape we wish to see - respectful of humans and of the planet, transparent & open !
