scholarly journals Managing a Circular Food System in Sustainable Urban Farming. Experimental Research at the Turku University Campus (Finland)

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (11) ◽  
pp. 6231
Author(s):  
Leena Erälinna ◽  
Barbara Szymoniuk

People around the world pay increasingly more attention to health, social, environmental, and ethical issues. As a consequence, they seek value in food that is fresh, less processed, and sustainably sourced. The article presents an experimental project supporting the implementation of a circular food system in the city of Turku, Finland. The outcome of the project is a globally replicable concept of managing a local circular food system in sustainable urban farming. The project had two objectives: (1) to reduce food waste in restaurants in the Turku University Campus; (2) to support local recycling of nutrients by composting food waste generated in the pilot restaurant and reuse the nutrients in the process of urban farming. The presented concept is based on the results of two experimental studies. It ties in with UN and EU sustainable development strategies and policies, e.g., Sustainable Development Goals (2, 11, and 12), the European Green Deal, the Farm to Fork Strategy, and the concepts of Circular Economy and Sustainable Cities.

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 1721
Author(s):  
Marta Estrada ◽  
Diego Monferrer ◽  
Alma Rodríguez ◽  
Miguel Ángel Moliner

Education must guide students’ emotional development, not only to improve their skills and help them achieve their maximum performance, but to establish the foundations of a more cooperative and compassionate society. Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, therefore, implies focusing on emotional aspects as well as financial, social, environmental, and scientific objectives. In this line, the goal of this study is to show how emotional intelligence, which is an essential dimension in the development and management of emotional competences required to build sustainable societies, plays a key role in optimising student’s academic performance in the classroom through compassion and academic commitment. The research model was tested with a questionnaire addressed to 550 students from four higher education institutions and one secondary school. The results of a structural equation analysis confirmed the study hypotheses. Emotional intelligence was shown to be positively related to compassion and higher levels of commitment, which, consequently, led to better academic performance. This finding will encourage interest in developing emotional intelligence, not only for its long-term value in training healthy citizens, but also for its short-term results in the classroom.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Franco Fassio

Food, the basic connecting unit of all the UN's Sustainable Development Goals, plays a crucial role in the ecological transition towards a circular economic paradigm. This paper takes scientific considerations as a starting point in order to contribute to the definition of a theoretical-operational framework in which to grow the Circular Economy for Food. This is a still-open question in a sector of the circular economy that is emerging as vital to sustainable development. The 3 C's of Capital, Cyclicality and Co-evolution offer a systemic, holistic vision of the food system's role. Within this conceptual framework, the designers can find the main boundaries of the system, within which to express their creativity. The aim must be to avoid damaging relationships with the best supplier of raw material known to humanity (Nature), respecting planetary boundaries and at the same time offering a fair space to civil society.


Author(s):  
Natalie Herdzoia ◽  
Ernst Worrell ◽  
Floris van den Berg

A shift towards more environmentally friendly and socially responsible food systems is a key step in the achievement of global sustainable development goals. To obtain significant results, however, it is essential to find participative ways to frame food sustainability objectives, so they can speak to a wide array of actors of change. This article addresses the promising potential of empowering actors across the food system to make a shift in their food choices, by facilitating the association of food sustainability values with contemporary moral issues. In this context, a conceptual framework for a transition towards food sustainability is proposed, based upon the concept of the moral circle. This approach transcends the human-centred methods enacted in traditional sustainable development agendas, offering an alternative with a more holistic perspective. It is expected that emphasising moral reflection around sustainability might encourage societal participation in the creation of sustainable, fair and healthier food systems.


2021 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sebastian Kretschmer ◽  
Johannes Kahl

Interacting driving forces in food systems, resulting in cumulative driver effects and synergies, induce non-linear processes in multiple directions. This paper critically reviews the discourse on driving forces in food systems and argues that mindset is the primary predictor for food system outcomes. In the epoch of sustainable development goals (SDGs) and the Anthropocene, mindset matters more than ever. Transformative narratives are beginning to transcend the dominant social paradigm, which is still driving the food system's overall trajectory. The psychosocial portrayal of the systemic mindset found in organic food systems presented in this paper “flips the script” and hypothesizes that worldview and paradigm have the most causal linkages with unsustainable driver synergies and reversely the biggest leverage on the mitigation thereof. Borrowing from ecological economics discourses, the paper sharpens the driver definition by applying the DPSIR analytical tool as a modified diagnostic framework and modeling approach for food systems. This research sheds new light on the nature of drivers of change, which are often portrayed as almighty and inevitable trends shaping food systems. Instead, it is proposed that drivers emerge from the actors' mindset, affecting food system behavior in a non-linear way. Mindset drives reinforcing feedback loops, resulting in vicious and virtuous cycles. These driver motives manifest in subsystems and continue to drive their interaction across food system elements. Mindset acts as an encapsulated input of food systems, all the while responding to feedback and releasing new drivers. A transformation framework along leverage points of the food system is presented that features the concept of SDG drivers.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shanta Dutta ◽  
Iris K. M. Yu ◽  
Jiajun Fan ◽  
James H. Clark ◽  
Daniel C. W. Tsang

This study provides new and critical insights into sustainable catalytic conversion of food (bread) waste to platform chemicals for achieving sustainable development goals and fostering a circular economy.


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (10) ◽  
pp. 261
Author(s):  
Helen Kopnina

This article will discuss social, environmental, and ecological justice in education for sustainable development (ESD) and Education for Sustainable Development Goals (ESDG). The concept of sustainable development and, by extension, the ESD, places heavy emphasis on the economic and social aspects of sustainability. However, the ESD falls short of recognizing ecological justice, or recognition that nonhumans also have a right to exist and flourish. An intervention in the form of an undergraduate course titled Politics, Business, and Environment (PBE) will be discussed. As part of this course, students were asked to reflect on the three pillars of sustainable development: society, economy, and environment, linking these to the fourth concept, ecological justice or biospheric egalitarianism. Biospheric egalitarianism is characterized by the recognition of intrinsic value in the environment and is defined as concern about justice for the environment. Some of the resulting exam answers are analyzed, demonstrating students’ ability to recognize the moral and pragmatic limitations of the anthropocentric approach to justice. This analysis presents ways forward in thinking about the role of “ecological justice” as the ultimate bottom line upon which both society and economy are based.


Author(s):  
Atih Rohaeti Dariah ◽  
Muhammad Syukri Salleh ◽  
Mahyudin Bin Yahaia ◽  
Ade Yunita Mafruhat

This paper aims to suggest an integration of dimensions, especially economic, social, environmental, and politics that are embedded in Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) within a framework called Umran. This Umranic framework hails from the idea of distinguished Muslim philosopher, historian and sociologist Ibn Khaldun, that is based on Islamic doctrines. As the present integration of the dimensions seems to be problematic, an exploration into the integration within Umranic framework is believed to be potentially a contributive endeavor. Based on an overview of literatures and a content analysis, this paper found that integrating dimensions of SDGs within the Umranic framework appears in the triangle of relationship between God, humans, and environment. This triangle exists in the form of an Islamic economic system. In this system, economic activities of natural resource utilization in various types of ownership undertake the sustainability dimension, that is the environmental protection and the promotion of equitable distribution, followed by the implementation of management of ownership and distribution rights according to Islamic rules. The pre-requisite on the part of the players is the high levels of spirituality. The application of this Islamic economic system followed by its political dimension will guarantee the achievement of SDGs even though it needs adjustment to a number of SDGs’ indicators that are not in accordance to Islamic teachings.


2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (6) ◽  
pp. 82
Author(s):  
Atih R. Dariah ◽  
Muhammad S. Salleh ◽  
Mahyudin bin Yahaia ◽  
Ade Y. Mafruhat

This paper aims to suggest an integration of dimensions, especially economic, social, environmental, and politics that are embedded in Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) within a framework called Umran. This Umranic framework hails from the idea of distinguished Muslim philosopher, historian and sociologist Ibn Khaldun, that is based on Islamic doctrines. As the present integration of the dimensions seems to be problematic, an exploration into the integration within Umranic framework is believed to be potentially a contributive endeavor. Based on an overview of literatures and a content analysis, this paper found that integrating dimensions of SDGs within the Umranic framework appears in the triangle of relationship between God, humans, and environment. This triangle exists in the form of an Islamic economic system. In this system, economic activities of natural resource utilization in various types of ownership undertake the sustainability dimension, that is the environmental protection and the promotion of equitable distribution, followed by the implementation of management of ownership and distribution rights according to Islamic rules. The pre-requisite on the part of the players is the high levels of spirituality. The application of this Islamic economic system followed by its political dimension will guarantee the achievement of SDGs even though it needs adjustment to a number of SDGs’ indicators that are not in accordance to Islamic teachings.


Author(s):  
Siti Fatimahwati Pehin Dato Musa ◽  
Khairul Hidayatullah Basir ◽  
Edna Luah

This paper intends to explore the development of agriculture in to smart farming and how smart farming can contribute to the sustainable development goals. The paper focuses on how smart farming can be imparted in sustainable agriculture by analyzing the environmental, economic and social impact. This paper applied a systematic literature review technique to assess published academic literature on smart farming and sustainable agriculture in Southeast Asia. The review identified that smart farming can lead to less environmental damage, lower cost and higher productivity and has the potential to create decent jobs for the youth ultimately leading to a sustainable food system.


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