Note that these are only ideas derived from studying the structure of the problem. I hope this will help you start
your own initiatives.

Two Official Recommendations For All People

It is estimated that about 3% of adult population in Finland is vegetarian, yet there is no official food-based dietary recommendation for them offered by the National Nutrition Council whereas Swedish is one of two official languages although it is spoken by only 6% of the population. Chicken or the egg: Is it because there is only so few vegetarians so that the council does not offer a one, or there is no official recommendation, so that many people fail to substitute what is required to stay healthy turning vegetarian or vegan? Vegetarians, especially vegans often have to battle with their family to prove its perfectly healthy to stay vegan. Official food-based dietary recommendation is the cornerstone of healthier nation and the point of departure for non-experts and families to healthier food choices, thus invaluable asset to the society. What about one ordinary food pyramid and another for vegan?

In Flight Food Choice As Brand Strategy

When you’re flying with an intercontinental flight, your typical in-flight food choice is either chicken or beef although you could choose to have vegan or vegetarian meal in advance if the airline provides such an option. What if the default is vegetarian and those who want chicken, beef or vegan will have to choose? What if it costs only one Euro more? The airline will stand out as the first airline on this planet to be brave enough to do so, and get a massive free exposure on various media all around the world. What would you expect more as an airline in this turbulent economy? This of course will be a huge possibility to educate the world about the issue and other airlines will also slowly follow — it’s a true Trojan Horse.

Fantastic, Awesome Wild Mushrooms

90% of wild mushrooms — the meat of the vegetable world — is being wasted in Finland, and there seem to be conflicts between wild mushroom companies that hire workers from the Far East and the Finnish residents near the forest where the mushrooms are picked. Why not utilise already existing information and create an smart phone applications that updates and alerts on weekly basis? What about seasonal public transportation, festival, and competition? Mush- room is well suited in Finnish traditional food culture and walking in the woods is very healthy activity!

No Substitute, New Food.

We easily find substitutes when we try to cut back on meat and dairy — vegetarian meatball, soy yogurt, and soy mozzarella, which only manifests that ‘imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.’ In contrast, tofu can be as interesting and diverse as different meat cuts and cheese varieties. Let’s invent new food that meets the expectations of Finnish population.

New Gastronomy

If you want to lead the trend in fashion, you create haute couture. Should you wish to change the food choices of ordinary people, you want to work with gastronomic restaurateurs. Just like the way we brought Kyyttö back to production, we can do so with native Finland fruits, vegetables, and herbs by connecting them with gastronomy, so that people will slowly change their perception of good food. A cookery competition on TV is a must, and cookbook is a plus!

Healthier And Easy Laatikko

Healthy options do not matter if they are not available off the shelf and yet affordable — especially for Finnish people. This is especially true to families with children in late 30’s and early 40’s who are working long hours while taking care of their sons and daughters at the same time. This group is exceptionally important as they are heavily influencing what the next generation will eat. Introduce effortless and wholesome recipe for them.

Healthy Superstore!

S Group is a co-operative owned by 1.9 million Finns, the market-share of which accounts for 44% of whole retail grocery sales in Finland, and therefore its decisions and policies affect the everyday life of almost all Finns in one way or the other. Yet, S Group is failing to nudge their customers in healthier direction while working hard to provide what the customers want even if that is unhealthy options. Let’s create a ‘Concept Super- store’ that sells everything but meat, alcohol, unhealthy snack and candy.

Attention, Home Economics

Education plays a crucial role in food choices, which can happen at every stage of one’s life by various means. There are many cooking courses in Suomenkielinen työväenopisto but usually ones with foreign recipe or with vegetarian ones are most popular. We are teaching our children, however, how to cook with ground beef in home economics courses rather than with fresh eggplant or zucchini as the main ingredient. By following one’s life span, we’ll discover critical points where people are more open- minded than usual. What about newly pregnant moms or families with newly born children? What about lunchroom of a kinder garden?

Bean Based Option In Every Restaurant

Beans, seeds, peas, nuts are healthy alternatives. Beans especially are also environmentally beneficial as they sequestrate nitrogen from the air into soil, so that farmers need not use synthetic fertiliser in the following year. Work with and help catering businesses and create tasty and good recipe with beans, seeds, peas and nuts that are as locally sourced as possible.

Vegetarian Canteen For All People

There is a vegetarian restaurant called Kipsari at Aalto School of Arts, Design and Architecture. Interestingly, only 15% of their customers turned out to be vegetarian, and the rest were not! Also in Zucchini downtown Helsinki not all the customers are vegetarians–they just enjoy vegetables for lunch. During the last decade eating out at the lunchrooms at workplace and schools has become increasingly influential on food consumption in Finland. About 2 million meals are eaten outside home daily, every second of them at school canteens. Vegetarian canteen doesn’t only serve vegetarians or vegans but also those who would come there with colleagues and friends, or who likes to try out something new.

Promote Smaller Dairy Farms With Longer Breeding Cycle In Central Finland

Industrial dairy farms with two hundred cows cannot use all the manure in a closed circle and produce low-quality beef, but many smaller farms with 10 or 20 cows with lengthened — or actually, traditional — breeding cycle do it while producing better quality beef in smaller quantity. Smaller quantity and better quality is a good thing for Finland as we need to reduce overall consumption, and there is a lot to leverage in subsidy structure and regulations in grocery retail chains to help farmers go back where they were.