On Wednesday evening at the BBC Food and Farming Awards in Bristol, the BBC World Service Global Champion Award was presented to Akshaya Patra – the world’s largest charity-run school meals project. This is the third year The Food Chain has presented its Global Champion Award. It looks for a person or project who is changing the way we produce, process, consume or even think about food for the better.
Head judge, Iranian-American writer, chef
Akshaya Patra believes that no child should be deprived of education because of hunger. It
Akshaya Patra
Shridhar Venkat, CEO of Akshaya Patra said: “It’s a matter of great pride for us to be selected for this award. I would like to thank the BBC World Service, on behalf of 1.75 million children whom we serve every day, day after day. Thank you so much.”
Stephen Titherington, Senior Commissioning Editor, BBC World Service, said: “Akshaya Patra is a great winner, and we’re so glad the competition has had such support from the public and from the judges. The need to understand the difficulties for many of finding enough to eat is crucial; understanding the economics and the politics of food is a vital part of understanding the world.”
Full list of judges:
• Gaggan Annand – Indian chef and owner of the world-famous Gaggan restaurant in Bangkok, Thailand.
• Arnold Kreilhuber – Deputy Director of UN Environment’s Law Division in Nairobi, Kenya
• Mavis Nduchwa, CEO of Chabana Farms – which champions organic farming in Botswana
• Marion Nestle – an American author and academic
• And our head judge – Samin Nosrat – an Iranian-American writer, chef
Shortlist:
• Lucy May – founder of The Organic Cookery School
• Akshaya Patra – India – a charity-run school lunch
• Richard Swannell – development director at WRAP, a UK charity aiming to reduce waste across a range of sectors. Richard has persuaded many supermarkets, manufacturers and suppliers – to sign up to voluntary agreements to waste less food.
• CGIAR – the world’s largest international agricultural research for development partnership. It’s active in 70 countries on four continents, with projects ranging from the international rice research institute based in the
• Food 4 Education – a non-profit