People living in low-income communities face food access issues that can lead to devastating chronic diseases. Fresh produce has been proven to enhance health outcomes for those who effectively increase their consumption. Rather than waiting until treatment is necessary, doctors can now prescribe healthy food in place of medicine, providing affordable access to fresh food, and the knowledge to use it effectively.
Here’s how it works: a patient diagnosed as at-risk qualifies for an intervention that includes the prescriber’s diagnosis, counseling from a nutritionist, basic nutrition and cooking education, and financial incentives to purchase produce. The patient participates in the program, buys and consumes more produce, and then visits the clinic to check in, adjust their health goals, and get a refill.
During the crisis in Flint, Michigan, it became clear that as a nation, we expect our cities to guarantee clean water to all people. When that doesn’t happen, we are rightfully indignant, but that was not always the case. It wasn’t until the turn of the century, when the connection between cholera and clean drinking water was made, that people began to view access to clean water as a public health issue.
Today, we are experiencing another “cholera moment” now with food; the correlation is evident between the influx of “unclean” food into communities of color and the alarming prevalence of diet-related chronic illnesses in these areas.
Ward 8 has the highest incidence of food-related chronic diseases in the Washington, D.C. area, and the community is burdened by a host of other hardships, including alarming rates of violence, illiteracy, unemployment, and poverty. DC Greens, Giant Foods, AmeriHealth Caritas DC, and DC Health recognized that the single grocery store serving a population of over 85,000 people in Ward 8 was likely a major contributing factor to the area’s health issues. To address this issue, the organizations banded together and created the DC Produce Rx program.
The DC Produce Rx program addresses three chronic conditions: diabetes, prediabetes, and hypertension. It equips doctors with the tools they need to provide low-income patients with prescriptions for fresh produce, and then combines food intervention with nutrition education to give ward residents confidence in making healthier food choices for themselves and their families.
This innovative program links food retailers, healthcare providers, and Medicaid providers to create better access to fresh fruits and vegetables as well as nutrition and wellness opportunities for Medicaid patients who are experiencing or at risk for diet-related chronic diseases. While a number of other cities across the country are administering similar programs, the Washington, D.C. program is unique because of its relationship with the largest Medicaid provider in the area, AmeriHealth Caritas DC, and because of the program’s access to patient medical records and claims data. This unprecedented access will provide the District with an opportunity to fully understand the ROI (return on investment, e.g., ambulatory utilization, acute utilization, total cost of care) of a program such as Produce Rx. The goal of this analysis will be to show that it’s both good policy and good business to fully integrate Produce Rx programs into more healthcare systems.
For Food is Medicine to become standard practice, partners that yearn to connect and collaborate, but lack the capacity to do so will need organizations willing to foster them. Government agencies can certainly play a role, but the value of community-based organizations lies in their ability to incubate creative ideas that can eventually scale. In the early stages of any program, it’s necessary to be nimble, responsive, and creative, and nonprofits are especially capable of making these quick adjustments to perfect a program.
DC Greens, with financial support from DC Health and AmeriHealth Caritas, has put these principles into practice with the DC Produce Rx Program. DC Greens recognizes that any meaningful systemic solution will require weaving previously unconnected players together and thus focuses its work on the spaces between different sectors. In this case, they’ve brought together the Washington, D.C. government, Medicaid payers, clinical partners, grocers, evaluators, and patients to create a resilient system with long-term stability.
People often ask what role DC Greens plays in the Produce Rx program, and the answer is: making it happen. DC Greens employees live and work in a city where there is a 17-year difference between the life expectancy in one area of the city (Ward 8, a high-poverty, largely African American neighborhood) and another (Ward 3, an affluent, mostly white neighborhood across town from Ward 8). Four of the top five leading causes of death in Ward 8 are diet-related chronic illnesses, and the diabetes rates in Ward 8 are 5 times higher than in Ward 3. We know that people in both communities want healthy food, but in Ward 8, they simply don’t have the means to buy it.
Creating the infrastructure that connects clinical care with healthy food access requires DC Greens to juggle a variety of roles that range from approaching partners, raising funds, figuring out workflows, and providing a return on investment. All of these efforts are aimed at demonstrating a model in which doctors routinely prescribe fruits and vegetables to food-insecure patients.
DC Greens also believes that a program like Produce Rx can help healthcare providers support local economies, with the added benefit of building new markets that can remove the risk for grocers with thin profit margins, and encourage them to carry more fruit and vegetables.
AmeriHealth Caritas DC (ACDC) is the managed care organization (MCO) for patients enrolled in the DC Produce Rx Program. Their interest is to see increased visits to a patient’s primary care practitioner (PCP), improved health biomarkers, and a reduction in ER admissions.
Given the increased relevance of social determinants, it has become fashionable to say that your zip code says more about your health outcome than a genetic test, which may explain the pivotal role that a D.C.-based data analytics firm plays in the DC Produce Rx program.
Socially Determined takes that analogy a step further by using highly refined tools to analyze social determinants of health on a smaller scale than by community level or zip code, but rather block by block, or house by house. This information helps healthcare providers assess risk. Socially Determined combines community-level contextual data from their national repository of social determinants of health (SDOH) data with risk scores captured from individual-level clinical, claims, screening, and programmatic data. This allows them to help clients like AmeriHealth Caritas identify SDOH risks at the domain level (e.g., food insecurity, crime, and housing instability) for communities and populations that the healthcare provider serves.
Harnessing the power of Socially Determined’s tools will provide a groundbreaking new approach for evaluating the impact of the Produce Rx intervention on claims-level outcomes. Measuring the specific quality and financial ROI implications of the program, and performing a comparative ROI analysis of various integration models of Produce Rx will hopefully be key drivers to convince other health insurance companies of the initiative’s viability.
Socially Determined began its work on the program by integrating three years of encounter-based EMR data into its analytic platform. This approach allowed them to analyze utilization patterns, chronic disease burdens, and other relevant clinical factors in their analysis. For their Produce Rx evaluation, they are focused on a more limited set of biometric data, which includes height, weight, BMI, A1c, and blood pressure for program participants for each clinical encounter during the intervention.
In every community and population Socially Determined has analyzed to date, food insecurity remains one of the most consistently impactful domains in terms of its correlation to elevated social risk, increased utilization, and cost.
At the close of its pilot program, Socially Determined will deliver a full evaluation report to the program partners that quantifies the impact of the intervention – clinically, financially, and experientially. Their analysis of the claims data during the pilot program may also provide key findings that help explain the role a Produce Prescription model can play as an evidence-based intervention to address food access and affordability, both of which are key drivers of food insecurity risk. Their strategic recommendations may also suggest additional communities or populations that could benefit from the program and/or potential refinements to the program design that would maximize impact and ROI.
Community of Hope is one of three Federally Qualified Health Centers that offer Produce Rx to AmeriHealth Patients in Ward 8. Their care coordinators enroll patients in the program and call prescriptions into the Giant pharmacy.
Community of Hope believes that the best way to improve health outcomes is to meet people where they are, listen to what’s getting in the way of their health (e.g., taking care of others at the expense of oneself, distrust of the healthcare system, trauma, lack of resources, etc.), and build trust by meeting those needs with compassion and high-quality services and referrals.
Produce Rx is an important new tool for addressing the barriers to good health, which include low health literacy, difficulty navigating the healthcare system, lack of transportation, and food insecurity.
After an AmeriHealth Caritas member is pre-screened by a medical clinic worker for type 2 diabetes, pre-diabetes, or hypertension, and is also found to be food insecure, they become eligible to participate in the Produce Rx program. They are then referred to the Giant pharmacy in D.C.’s Ward 8, where they consult with a pharmacist, obtain medications prescribed by their physician, and receive a weekly $20 voucher for free produce. Anchoring the Produce Rx program in the supermarket’s pharmacy helps participants shift their perspectives on the role of food in their personal health by plainly showing that “food” is a medicine, just like any other pill.
In areas with patients on fixed incomes, the Produce Rx program allows patients to better allocate their resources and make smarter food choices. This strategy includes experimenting with produce, despite its shorter shelf-life compared to non-perishables. “We’ve positioned ourselves as a healthcare destination within the store for all our customers,” says Giant Pharmacist Samir Balile.
“Pharmacy is a changing field,” Samir explains. “First, pharmacists are the most accessible healthcare provider. There’s no copay, the wait times are short, we provide free professional advice, and we’re open 7 days a week! Second, we turn patient contacts into opportunities to make important clinical interventions.” Pharmacists can identify gaps in patient care, provide immunizations, educate patients, and emphasize the importance of medication adherence, as well as other potential deterrents patients may experience in trying to adhere to their medication regimens. These daily tasks that pharmacists complete can minimize healthcare costs such as hospitalizations, acute illness, and the cost of medications to mitigate undesired side effects.
Can he explain how medication compliance works, and why Produce Rx is a valuable tool to support this? “Pharmacies are now assessed by PDC (proportion of days covered),” Samir continues. “It’s a metric developed by insurance companies that dictate reimbursements based on patients’ adherence to their medication regimens (e.g., blood pressure, diabetes medications, cholesterol meds). From a pharmacy perspective, programs that incentivize individuals with free produce both increase adherence and allow pharmacists to address any medication-related issues the patients may be experiencing. From a retailer perspective, this program also increases foot traffic into the store and can drive further sales. It’s a win-win.”
The pharmacist then provides a warm hand-off to Giant’s in-store nutritionist, Jillian, who offers store tours and free one-on-one counseling. Everything Jillian teaches helps to increase food literacy, including what to look for on product labels when managing weight, cholesterol, blood pressure, diabetes, or overall wellness, and understanding the different roles of macro and micronutrients. When people become confident in their daily decisions about food, they see positive changes in their health outcomes.
Giant’s nutritionists can be found in stores across Maryland, D.C., and Virginia. While Jillian will meet any customer who makes an appointment, she often receives referrals from Giant pharmacists, local clinicians, and other community members.
What questions is she asked most? How to read a product’s nutrition facts and how to determine the correct portion sizes, saturated fat, sugar or calories in the foods they should be eating.
Produce Rx is currently available at three healthcare centers across D.C. While it’s too early in the program to see changes in health outcomes, data on program usage is available: 72% of participants are actively using the program, meaning that they have visited the pharmacy to fill their prescription at least once since enrollment. On average, 86% of the vouchers distributed to participants on a monthly basis are used by participants to purchase fruits and vegetables.
In the long term, Produce Rx is expected to improve health-related outcomes relating to body mass index, blood pressure, and blood glucose levels among individuals with pre-diabetes or diabetes. As patients visit their primary care physician more often to pick up their produce prescriptions, they will also have more frequent health check-ins and develop better relationships with their providers. As a result, Produce Rx is expected to decrease total healthcare expenditures and emergency care utilization costs among participating Medicaid patients. These cross-cutting findings have the potential to embed a “food as medicine” approach across the local healthcare system by illustrating the role of food in shaping the social determinants of health. Produce Rx redefines fresh, healthy food as a critical component of clinical care, and offers a promising solution for sustainably improving patient health at a time when Medicaid providers, clinics, and hospital systems are searching for ways to lower rates of chronic disease and manage their costs.
There are many ways to assess whether a program “works.” As pre-diabetic and diabetic patients change their relationship with food and are able to access healthier diets, they will stabilize their conditions and engage more fully with their healthcare system.
With the DC Produce Rx Program, doctors have noted that they “finally have a way to help patients follow their medical advice.” Patients say that their diets have changed and that they are modeling new behaviors for their children. At Giant, pharmacists say they are seeing patients more frequently and that their teams are able to follow up with patients on their overall medication compliance. With the unprecedented access to claims, data gathered through the partnership between AmeriHealth Caritas and Socially Determined, cost savings on ER diversion, medication compliance, prevention of disease progression, and much more can now be analyzed. Hopefully, capturing data from Food is Medicine initiatives like the DC Produce Rx program will lead to increased investment from the healthcare system in providing access to healthy food as a key component of prevention.
About
Lexicon of Food is produced by The Lexicon, an international NGO that brings together food companies, government agencies, financial institutions, scientists, entrepreneurs, and food producers from across the globe to tackle some of the most complex challenges facing our food systems.
Team
The Food is Medicine Channel was developed by an invitation-only food systems solutions activator created by The Lexicon with support from Food at Google. This activator model fosters unprecedented collaborations between leading food service companies, environmental NGOs, government agencies, and technical experts from across the globe.
This website was built by The Lexicon™, a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt nonprofit organization headquartered in Petaluma, CA.
Check out our Privacy Policy, Cookie Policy, and Terms of Use.
© 2024 – Lexicon of Food™
We have no idea who grows our food, what farming practices they use, the communities they support, or what processing it undergoes before reaching our plates.
As a result, we have no ability to make food purchases that align with our values as individuals, or our missions as companies.
To change that, we’ve asked experts to demystify the complexity of food purchasing so that you can better informed decisions about what you buy.
The Lexicon of Food’s community of experts share their insights and experiences on the complex journey food takes to reach our plates. Their work underscores the need for greater transparency and better informed decision-making in shaping a healthier and more sustainable food system for all.
Professionals at universities and research institutions seeking scholarly articles, data, and resources.
Tools to align investment and grant making strategies with advances in agriculture, food production, and emerging markets.
Professionals seeking information on ingredient sourcing, menu planning, sustainability, and industry trends.
Chefs and food industry professionals seeking inspiration on ingredients and sustainable trends to enhance their work.
Individuals interested in food products, recipes, nutrition, and health-related information for personal or family use.
Individuals producing food, fiber, feed, and other agricultural products that support both local and global food systems.
This online platform is years in the making, featuring the contributions of 1000+ companies and NGOs across a dzen domain areas. To introduce you to their work, we’ve assembled personalized experiences with insights from our community of international experts.
Businesses engaged in food production, processing, and distribution that seek insight from domain experts
Those offering specialized resources and support and guidance in agriculture, food production, and nutrition.
Individuals who engage and educate audience on themes related to agriculture, food production, and nutrition.
Nutritional information for professionals offering informed dietary choices that help others reach their health objectives
Those advocating for greater awareness and stronger action to address climate impacts on agriculture and food security.
Professionals seeking curriculum materials, lesson plans, and learning tools related to food and agriculture.
Over half the world’s agricultural production comes from only three crops. Can we bring greater diversity to our plates?
In the US, four companies control nearly 85% of the beef we consume. Can we develop more regionally-based markets?
How can we develop alternatives to single-use plastics that are more sustainable and environmentally friendly?
Could changing the way we grow our food provide benefits for people and the planet, and even respond to climate change?
Can we meet the growing global demand for protein while reducing our reliance on traditional animal agriculture?
It’s not only important what we eat but what our food comes in. Can we develop tools that identify toxic materials used in food packaging?
Explore The Lexicon’s collection of immersive storytelling experiences featuring insights from our community of international experts.
The Great Protein Shift
Our experts use an engaging interactive approach to break down the technologies used to create these novel proteins.
Ten Principles for Regenerative Agriculture
What is regenerative agriculture? We’ve developed a framework to explain the principles, practices, ecological benefits and language of regenerative agriculture, then connected them to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.
Food-related chronic diseases are the biggest burden on healthcare systems. What would happen if we treated food as medicine?
How can we responsibly manage our ocean fisheries so there’s enough seafood for everyone now and for generations to come?
Mobilizing agronomists, farmers, NGOs, chefs, and food companies in defense of biodiversity in nature, agriculture, and on our plates.
Can governments develop guidelines that shift consumer diets, promote balanced nutrition and reduce the risk of chronic disease?
Will sustainably raising shellfish, finfish, shrimp and algae meet the growing demand for seafood while reducing pressure on wild fisheries?
How can a universal visual language to describe our food systems bridge cultural barriers and increase consumer literacy?
What if making the right food choices could be an effective tool for addressing a range of global challenges?
Let’s start with climate change. While it presents our planet with existential challenges, biodiversity loss, desertification, and water scarcity should be of equal concern—they’re all connected.
Instead of seeking singular solutions, we must develop a holistic approach, one that channel our collective energies and achieve positive impacts where they matter most.
To maximize our collective impact, EBF can help consumers focus on six equally important ecological benefits: air, water, soil, biodiversity, equity, and carbon.
We’ve gathered domain experts from over 1,000 companies and organizations working at the intersection of food, agriculture, conservation, and climate change.
The Lexicon™ is a California-based nonprofit founded in 2009 with a focus on positive solutions for a more sustainable planet.
For the past five years, it has developed an “activator for good ideas” with support from Food at Google. This model gathers domain experts from over 1,000 companies and organizations working at the intersection of food, agriculture, conservation, and climate change.
Together, the community has reached consensus on strategies that respond to challenges across multiple domain areas, including biodiversity, regenerative agriculture, food packaging, aquaculture, and the missing middle in supply chains for meat.
Lexicon of Food is the first public release of that work.
Over half the world’s agricultural production comes from only three crops. Can we bring greater diversity to our plates?
In the US, four companies control nearly 85% of the beef we consume. Can we develop more regionally-based markets?
How can we develop alternatives to single-use plastics that are more sustainable and environmentally friendly?
Could changing the way we grow our food provide benefits for people and the planet, and even respond to climate change?
Can we meet the growing global demand for protein while reducing our reliance on traditional animal agriculture?
It’s not only important what we eat but what our food comes in. Can we develop tools that identify toxic materials used in food packaging?
Explore The Lexicon’s collection of immersive storytelling experiences featuring insights from our community of international experts.
The Great Protein Shift
Our experts use an engaging interactive approach to break down the technologies used to create these novel proteins.
Ten Principles for Regenerative Agriculture
What is regenerative agriculture? We’ve developed a framework to explain the principles, practices, ecological benefits and language of regenerative agriculture, then connected them to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.
Food-related chronic diseases are the biggest burden on healthcare systems. What would happen if we treated food as medicine?
How can we responsibly manage our ocean fisheries so there’s enough seafood for everyone now and for generations to come?
Mobilizing agronomists, farmers, NGOs, chefs, and food companies in defense of biodiversity in nature, agriculture, and on our plates.
Can governments develop guidelines that shift consumer diets, promote balanced nutrition and reduce the risk of chronic disease?
Will sustainably raising shellfish, finfish, shrimp and algae meet the growing demand for seafood while reducing pressure on wild fisheries?
How can a universal visual language to describe our food systems bridge cultural barriers and increase consumer literacy?
This game was designed to raise awareness about the impacts our food choices have on our own health, but also the environment, climate change and the cultures in which we live.
First, you can choose one of the four global regions and pick a character that you want to play.
Each region has distinct cultural, economic, historical, and agricultural capacities to feed itself, and each character faces different challenges, such as varied access to food, higher or lower family income, and food literacy.
As you take your character through their day, select the choices you think they might make given their situation.
At the end of the day you will get a report on the impact of your food choices on five areas: health, healthcare, climate, environment and culture. Take some time to read through them. Now go back and try again. Can you make improvements in all five areas? Did one area score higher, but another score lower?
FOOD CHOICES FOR A HEALTHY PLANET will help you better understand how all these regions and characters’ particularities can influence our food choices, and how our food choices can impact our personal health, national healthcare, environment, climate, and culture. Let’s Play!
The FOOD CHOICES FOR A HEALTHY PLANET game allows users to experience the dramatic connections between food and climate in a unique and engaging way. The venue and the game set-up provides attendees with a fun experience, with a potential to add a new layer of storytelling about this topic.
Starting the game: the pilot version of the game features four country/regions: Each reflects a different way people (and the national dietary guidelines) look at diets: Nordic Countries (sustainability), Brazil (local and whole foods instead of ultra-processed foods); Canada (plant-forward), and Indonesia (developing countries).
Personalizing the game: players begin by choosing a country and then a character who they help in making food choices over the course of one day. Later versions may allow for creating custom avatars.
Making tough food choices: This interactive game for all ages shows how the food choices we make impact our health and the environment, and even contribute to climate change.
What we eat matters: at the end of each game, players learn that every decision they make impacts not only their health, but a national healthcare system, the environment, climate and even culture.
We’d love to know more about you and why you think you will be a great fit for this position! Shoot us an email introducing you and we’ll get back to you as soon as possible!
Providing best water quality conditions to ensure optimal living condition for growth, breeding and other physiological needs
Water quality is sourced from natural seawater with dependency on the tidal system. Water is treated to adjust pH and alkalinity before stocking.
Producers that own and manages the farm operating under small-scale farming model with limited input, investment which leads to low to medium production yield
All 1,149 of our farmers in both regencies are smallholder farmers who operate with low stocking density, traditional ponds, and no use of any other intensification technology.
Safe working conditions — cleanliness, lighting, equipment, paid overtime, hazard safety, etc. — happen when businesses conduct workplace safety audits and invest in the wellbeing of their employees
Company ensure implementation of safe working conditions by applying representative of workers to health and safety and conduct regular health and safety training. The practices are proven by ASIC standards’ implementation
Implementation of farming operations, management and trading that impact positively to community wellbeing and sustainable better way of living
The company works with local stakeholders and local governments to create support for farmers and the farming community in increasing resilience. Our farming community is empowered by local stakeholders continuously to maintain a long generation of farmers.
Freezing seafood rapidly when it is at peak freshness to ensure a higher quality and longer lasting product
Our harvests are immediately frozen with ice flakes in layers in cool boxes. Boxes are equipped with paper records and coding for traceability. We ensure that our harvests are processed with the utmost care at <-18 degrees Celsius.
Sourcing plant based ingredients, like soy, from producers that do not destroy forests to increase their growing area and produce fish feed ingredients
With adjacent locations to mangroves and coastal areas, our farmers and company are committed to no deforestation at any scale. Mangrove rehabilitation and replantation are conducted every year in collaboration with local authorities. Our farms are not established in protected habitats and have not resulted from deforestation activity since the beginning of our establishment.
Implement only natural feeds grown in water for aquatic animal’s feed without use of commercial feed
Our black tiger shrimps are not fed using commercial feed. The system is zero input and depends fully on natural feed grown in the pond. Our farmers use organic fertilizer and probiotics to enhance the water quality.
Enhance biodiversity through integration of nature conservation and food production without negative impact to surrounding ecosysytem
As our practices are natural, organic, and zero input, farms coexist with surrounding biodiversity which increases the volume of polyculture and mangrove coverage area. Farmers’ groups, along with the company, conduct regular benthic assessments, river cleaning, and mangrove planting.
THE TERM “MOONSHOT” IS OFTEN USED TO DESCRIBE an initiative that goes beyond the confines of the present by transforming our greatest aspirations into reality, but the story of a moonshot isn’t that of a single rocket. In fact, the Apollo program that put Neil Armstrong on the moon was actually preceded by the Gemini program, which in a two-year span rapidly put ten rockets into space. This “accelerated” process — with a new mission nearly every 2-3 months — allowed NASA to rapidly iterate, validate their findings and learn from their mistakes. Telemetry. Propulsion. Re-entry. Each mission helped NASA build and test a new piece of the puzzle.
The program also had its fair share of creative challenges, especially at the outset, as the urgency of the task at hand required that the roadmap for getting to the moon be written in parallel with the rapid pace of Gemini missions. Through it all, the NASA teams never lost sight of their ultimate goal, and the teams finally aligned on their shared responsibilities. Within three years of Gemini’s conclusion, a man did walk on the moon.
FACT is a food systems solutions activator that assesses the current food landscape, engages with key influencers, identifies trends, surveys innovative work and creates greater visibility for ideas and practices with the potential to shift key food and agricultural paradigms.
Each activator focuses on a single moonshot; instead of producing white papers, policy briefs or peer-reviewed articles, these teams design and implement blueprints for action. At the end of each activator, their work is released to the public and open-sourced.
As with any rapid iteration process, many of our activators re-assess their initial plans and pivot to address new challenges along the way. Still, one thing has remained constant: their conviction that by working together and pooling their knowledge and resources, they can create a multiplier effect to more rapidly activate change.
Co-Founder
THE LEXICON
Vice President
Global Workplace Programs
GOOGLE
Who can enter and how selections are made.
A Greener Blue is a global call to action that is open to individuals and teams from all over the world. Below is a non-exhaustive list of subjects the initiative targets.
To apply, prospective participants will need to fill out the form on the website, by filling out each part of it. Applications left incomplete or containing information that is not complete enough will receive a low score and have less chance of being admitted to the storytelling lab.
Nonprofit organizations, communities of fishers and fish farmers and companies that are seeking a closer partnership or special support can also apply by contacting hello@thelexicon.org and interacting with the members of our team.
Special attention will be given to the section of the form regarding the stories that the applicants want to tell and the reasons for participating. All proposals for stories regarding small-scale or artisanal fishers or aquaculturists, communities of artisanal fishers or aquaculturists, and workers in different steps of the seafood value chain will be considered.
Stories should show the important role that these figures play in building a more sustainable seafood system. To help with this narrative, the initiative has identified 10 principles that define a more sustainable seafood system. These can be viewed on the initiative’s website and they state:
Seafood is sustainable when:
Proposed stories should show one or more of these principles in practice.
Applications are open from the 28th of June to the 15th of August 2022. There will be 50 selected applicants who will be granted access to The Lexicon’s Total Storytelling Lab. These 50 applicants will be asked to accept and sign a learning agreement and acceptance of participation document with which they agree to respect The Lexicon’s code of conduct.
The first part of the lab will take place online between August the 22nd and August the 26th and focus on training participants on the foundation of storytelling, supporting them to create a production plan, and aligning all of them around a shared vision.
Based on their motivation, quality of the story, geography, and participation in the online Lab, a selected group of participants will be gifted a GoPro camera offered to the program by GoPro For A Change. Participants who are selected to receive the GoPro camera will need to sign an acceptance and usage agreement.
The second part of the Storytelling Lab will consist of a production period in which each participant will be supported in the production of their own story. This period goes from August 26th to October 13th. Each participant will have the opportunity to access special mentorship from an international network of storytellers and seafood experts who will help them build their story. The Lexicon also provides editors, animators, and graphic designers to support participants with more technical skills.
The final deadline to submit the stories is the 14th of October. Participants will be able to both submit complete edited stories, or footage accompanied by a storyboard to be assembled by The Lexicon’s team.
All applicants who will exhibit conduct and behavior that is contrary to The Lexicon’s code of conduct will be automatically disqualified. This includes applicants proposing stories that openly discriminate against a social or ethnic group, advocate for a political group, incite violence against any group, or incite to commit crimes of any kind.
All submissions must be the entrant’s original work. Submissions must not infringe upon the trademark, copyright, moral rights, intellectual rights, or rights of privacy of any entity or person.
Participants will retain the copyrights to their work while also granting access to The Lexicon and the other partners of the initiative to share their contributions as part of A Greener Blue Global Storytelling Initiative.
If a potential selected applicant cannot be reached by the team of the Initiative within three (3) working days, using the contact information provided at the time of entry, or if the communication is returned as undeliverable, that potential participant shall forfeit.
Selected applicants will be granted access to an advanced Storytelling Lab taught and facilitated by Douglas Gayeton, award-winning storyteller and information architect, co-founder of The Lexicon. In this course, participants will learn new techniques that will improve their storytelling skills and be able to better communicate their work with a global audience. This skill includes (but is not limited to) how to build a production plan for a documentary, how to find and interact with subjects, and how to shoot a short documentary.
Twenty of the participants will receive a GoPro Hero 11 Digital Video and Audio Cameras by September 15, 2022. Additional participants may receive GoPro Digital Video and Audio Cameras to be announced at a later date. The recipients will be selected by advisors to the program and will be based on selection criteria (see below) on proposals by Storytelling Lab participants. The selections will keep in accordance with Lab criteria concerning geography, active participation in the Storytelling Lab and commitment to the creation of a story for the Initiative, a GoPro Camera to use to complete the storytelling lab and document their story. These recipients will be asked to sign an acceptance letter with terms of use and condition to receive the camera.
The Lexicon provides video editors, graphic designers, and animators to support the participants to complete their stories.
The submitted stories will be showcased during international and local events, starting from the closing event of the International Year of Fisheries and Aquaculture 2022 in Rome, in January 2023. The authors of the stories will be credited and may be invited to join.
Storytelling lab participation:
Applicants that will be granted access to the storytelling Lab will be evaluated based on the entries they provided in the online form, and in particular:
Applications will be evaluated by a team of 4 judges from The Lexicon, GSSI and the team of IYAFA (Selection committee).
When selecting applications, the call promoters may request additional documentation or interviews both for the purpose of verifying compliance with eligibility requirements and to facilitate proposal evaluation.
Camera recipients:
Participants to the Storytelling Lab who will be given a GoPro camera will be selected based on:
The evaluation will be carried out by a team of 4 judges from The Lexicon, GSSI and the team of IYAFA (Selection committee).
Incidental expenses and all other costs and expenses which are not specifically listed in these Official Rules but which may be associated with the acceptance, receipt and use of the Storytelling Lab and the camera are solely the responsibility of the respective participants and are not covered by The Lexicon or any of the A Greener Blue partners.
All participants who receive a Camera are required to sign an agreement allowing GoPro for a Cause, The Lexicon and GSSI to utilize the films for A Greener Blue and their promotional purposes. All participants will be required to an agreement to upload their footage into the shared drive of The Lexicon and make the stories, films and images available for The Lexicon and the promoting partners of A Greener Blue.