Fairfood - Southampton

FAIR-food Southampton Community Researcher projects 2026

The FAIR-food Community Researchers in Southampton have designed their own research projects and questions to find out how the food pantries might be improved:

Specific digestive health conditions ~ Donna Tomlin How can food pantries better meet the needs of people living with specific health conditions like Diabetes and Coeliac disease?
Neurodiversity & community food ~ Mark Kirby : In what ways do different food provision models support or hinder access for neurodivergent adults, and how does this compare across pantries, social supermarkets, and food parcel schemes?
Access in Mansbridge ~ Anne Work: What are the barriers to accessing food pantries for Mansbridge residents?
Dignity in food pantries ~ Lana Gavin: How does shopping at a food pantry make you feel?
Redesigning pantries ~ Carli Evans: How do we redesign food aid at a micro level to reduce food waste and food insecurity?
Food waste ~ Gary Sharman: How do stakeholders consider that food waste be minimised and donations optimised in food pantry settings?

For more details of the community research, see our blog: Fairfood - Blog.

Community Research Findings

Please see the Community Researchers' research posters below for details of the findings.

Out of the 6 projects, the Community Researchers together created 12 recommendations
These recommendations were presented at the FAIR Co-production Assembly on 16^th July 2026 to Southampton City councillors, council officers, food aid providers, charity professionals and academic researchers
At the Co-production Assembly, we deliberated on the findings and recommendations and produced an action plan, which we will be working on and tracking over the next 2 years
For example, from the recommendations, one pantry will be piloting new evening opening hours to be more accessible to people with day-time work, which will be supported by the FAIR online platform

Poster project 1: Specific digestive health conditions ~ Donna Tomlin