Sherlockai

Nornir has been working with volunteers to try and harness the power and the surge in interest around AI.  The plan is not to try and just maximise profit by using AI, but to use the technology for social purposes.

We have therefore developed a new Chatbot style system that is aimed to help ex offenders to adapt to life on release from prison. The release from prison can be a very challenging time for people, especially if the person has spent a long time in jail. Often these problems are simple to overcome but not if you are already traumatised by your life situation. The chatbot can help to provide this support by being available 24/7 ready to answer questions and support people who are most vulnerable.

An important point to note is that the chatbot hasn’t been designed by some teckies working in isolation. Its been co-developed by people with lived in experience of the criminal justice system making it relevant to their needs.

There has been a lot of interest from organisations who support ex offenders and we now have 2 live systems up and running.

For more information visit the web site at: https://www.sherlockai.org/

Peas growing in a raised bed

In the first 3 months we have been busy building the necessary partnerships required to make the work sustainable. This has included the following:

We have established a partnership with the Manchester Urban Diggers who are based at Platt Fields in Manchester. MUD already have a working kitchen and are excited about starting to also use it to create ready meals using their home-grown food surpluses. They are planning to run one cooking session in July as a test run. But due to the fact that its early in the season we must source surplus foods from other providers because the crops in the ground are not ready until Autumn.

We are looking to get Community Payback individual placements to help staff up the cooking process and are in negotiations with GM Probation about making this happen. Also how to get a CP team to work in the gardens growing food for the kitchens.

We have made links to a range of other interested organisations including Eat Well Manchester, Open Kitchen, Bread and Butter and also exploring the option of using a commercial kitchen at Yane Restaurant in Chorlton.

MUD is planning a Gleaning activity in the Autumn and we are making preparations for the CP teams to be part of the process and for the food gleaned, to be used in the production of ready meals.

Nornir has created a strategic partnership with GM Probation exploring how we can further develop the use of CP teams and individual placements to help support the Foundational Economy.

Staff at Nornir are seeking to build a large scale vermiculture programme in North Wales. The aim is to process 1000 tons (a year) of cow manure into organic fertiliser and once the work process is established, we will be looking to try and import the model into Greater Manchester.

Development of the growing area at Forever Fields

Nornir have been busy working with other stakeholders at Forever Fields in Manchester. To date we have arranged for a team of Community Payback workers to visit the site each Monday where they are working creating a new growing space. The results so far are shown in the photo above. So the growing of food has started at Forever Fields  - but its next season before we get full crops.

In the kitchen at Forever Fields, we have already cooked 186 ready meals using surplus and donated foods. This has been achieved using a chef and 2 community volunteers as well as CP workers helping out in the kitchen.

We have plans to continue to cook ready meals at the site and donate them to local Pantries via our links with Eat Well Manchester: https://www.eatwellmcr.org/

Our plans have been helped because Forever Fields are now appointing a full-time centre manager to help coordinate all the activities at the centre.

There has been development at the site with a base being built for the container that will be used to grow mushrooms. The plan is to use the mushrooms in the ready meals as a way of providing protein without resorting to cheap meat.

The major barrier at the moment is accessing enough surplus foods for the cooking. We are in talks with a range of other organisations who are involved in austerity retail to see how we can over come the problem. One possibly activity is to join a Gleaning later in the year where we can gather a large crop of some specific vegetables.

We are also pursuing links in regarding to developing a vermiculture presence on the site. This has been mostly with the experts at Egino Emerging: https://www.eginoemerging.org/

Ready meals waiting collection

Pilot production run on the 3^rd June 2024 produced 59 meals for donation to foodbanks, community pantries etc through the charity Eat Well Manchester https://www.eatwellmcr.org/

A chef and 2 community volunteers were joined by 2 volunteers from the Monday UPW team (Community Payback Scheme) who worked as kitchen assistants preparing ready meals from the produce grown and supplemented by donated and surplus produce.

One of the aims was to produce a nutritious and eco friendly meal to help combat both food poverty but also protein poverty. As such we substituted meat with mushrooms with a mixture of seasonal vegetables.

The next pilot production run is planned for 24^th June 2024 with 120 meal target, then every Monday thereafter (surplus and freshly grown food supplies permitting).

Further sessions are planned as we now seek additional surplus foods from the community and local businesses.

 The work is funded by the National Lottery Awards For All Programme

GM Foundational Innovation Fund

Our Phase 1 project demonstrated that, not only is Probation a key service of the Foundational Economy and also that people on probation can be key workers themselves.  This is achieved by increasing the innovation capacity and sustainability of organisations working in and with the Foundational Economy, specifically those in the ‘Austerity Food Retail’ sector.

‘Austerity Food Retail’(AFR) refers to local pantries, social supermarkets and other forms of cooperative and community shops offering highly discounted products to people in food poverty. They usually make use of donated and surplus/rejected foods which would otherwise be thrown away.

Our Phase 1 project in 2023/4 successfully provided Stockport Homes’ austerity retailer ‘Your Local Pantry’ https://www.yourlocalpantry.co.uk/  with proof of this concept. It created a means of retailing more locally produced non-surplus healthy food to its members to supplement the dwindling supplies of often poor-quality surplus and donated food available to them, without having to raise their weekly membership fees to pay for it.  Phase 1 did this by working with people on probation who are subject to an Unpaid Work requirement of a Community Order (‘Community Payback’) to:

•      grow fresh seasonal fruit, vegetables, and salads on unused/under-used public land in Stockport for onward donation to the Pantries.

•      assess the feasibility of manufacturing value-added food products from the produce grown for onward donation to the Pantries.

Our new Phase 2 project (April 2024 to June 2025) builds directly on Phase 1 aims and deliverables by

• Our model/business plan, of using CP to grow fresh produce for donation to the pantries to generate new income streams from commercial production will continue and develop. This will enable them to continue to bulk-buy their own supplies of locally produced non-surplus healthy food.
• Rolling out the Model of at a further 3 sites in Stockport, Manchester and Trafford, thus supplying AFR in Greater Manchester with locally produced healthy non-surplus fresh food free of charge.
• Enhancing the model with the commercial production of mushrooms. Facilitating the manufacture of value-added food products from the produce grown in the form of:

1. Frozen healthy ready meal production at each hub, also for onward donation to AFR.
2. Using mushrooms as a meat substitute from freshly grown mushrooms at each hub for use in the ready meals.

• developing training and progression routes into employment in the food and retail sectors of the Foundational Economy for people successfully completing their Community Payback on the project - helping plug the ‘skills gap’ in the food and retail sectors of the Foundational Economy.