Institutional portal - Municipality of Milan

The digital campaign "Catch the wave, lead the change" starts tomorrow

Milan 21 April 2021 – Cities, young people and climate change: a new alliance between citizens of the future, local communities and institutions. This is the recipe for Food wave, the project of the Municipality of Milan to give girls and boys aged 15 to 35 the tools to guide the global transition towards a sustainable food system by 2030. The project is led by the Municipality of Milan, co-financed from the European Commission with around 8 million euros through the DEAR (Development education and awareness raising) program and involves 17 cities (including London, Madrid, Warsaw and Sao Paulo in Brazil), 13 civil society organizations and the C40 network, the international network of cities committed to fighting climate change.

It is on the occasion of World Earth Day, which will be held tomorrow, Thursday 22 April, that the municipal administration will present Food wave - Empowering urban youth for climate action, through a digital challenge - "Catch the wave, lead the change" - which it will be launched at 12 on the institutional channels of the Municipality to invite young people to join the wave of change.

Food wave is a project that focuses on environmental issues, but also a cultural project that puts young people, communities and creativity at the center of experimentation: within the framework of the project, financial support will be provided to creative, artistic ideas and innovative products with the invitation to young people to present proposals to rethink the way of consuming and producing food in cities, transforming disused areas and experimenting with new economic activities.

The whole project will be accompanied by a participation platform, digital discussion networks and forums, university web radios, creative activities, artistic competitions and audiovisual productions to also mobilize young creatives to contribute to the new project.

Digital schools and training courses, laboratories in the peripheral urban areas of cities, international exchanges, urban and peri-urban agriculture experiments, will have the common goal of training and supporting young urban farmers and responsible consumers.

The ambitious goal is to involve 15 million young Europeans. Urban policies play a crucial role in stimulating sustainable economic systems, but it is together with the younger generations that cities can launch a collective effort to promote sustainable food consumption and production practices, and build a green and inclusive future for European cities, with particular attention to peripheral areas.

The first one is already open public notice. You have until May 3rd to participate in the call for Street actions to receive contributions for collective actions and events of a communicative, performative and participatory nature with the aim of raising awareness and involving especially young people, regarding the importance of practices, of sustainable lifestyles and food systems and urban agroecology in climate change mitigation.

The proposals will be presented through the platform of the Municipality of Milan.

Further information is available on the project website Food waves.

Public notice for the selection of projects for the creation of "Street actions" by Milanese youth associations to be supported through the granting of micro contributions as part of the European project "Food wave: empowering urban youth for climate action"