<b></b>Integrated Sustainability Evaluation of Field Environment for the Combinations of Tillage and Cover Crop Practices by FAO-SAFA (Sustainability Assessment of Food and Agriculture Systems) Applied with a Modified Rating Method

AbstractMany sustainability assessment frameworks have been developed in recent years, but translating them into practical tools to guide decision making remains challenging. By engaging coffee stakeholders in Uganda, we demonstrate a process of translating the widely-accepted framework for Sustainability Assessments of Food and Agriculture Systems (SAFA), developed by the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO), to smallholder production systems. Stakeholders prioritized the sustainability themes in terms of relevance and feasibility, and subsequently identified relevant sub-themes. We find that the structure and scope of some generally accepted themes need appropriate modifications in order to address the social and structural heterogeneity of smallholder production systems. Although importance and feasibility rankings significantly vary within and between stakeholder groups, governance and economic themes are commonly perceived as very important though equally the least feasible for smallholders. Thus, the inclusion of the ‘farmer-group’ structure as part of the sustainability assessment criteria is perceived as necessary especially toward achieving governance-related goals. These findings emphasize the need of engaging stakeholders in defining locally adapted sustainability assessment criteria.

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A UN SDGs-Based Sustainability Evaluation Framework for Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems (GIAHS): A Case Study on the Kuaijishan Ancient Chinese Torreya Community

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su13179957 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (17) ◽

pp. 9957

Author(s):

Wen Zhao ◽

Siming Wang ◽

Yongxun Zhang ◽

Ming Xu ◽

Hongkai Qie ◽

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Keyword(s):

Sustainable Development ◽

Environmental Sustainability ◽

Sustainability Assessment ◽

Evaluation Framework ◽

Evaluation Index System ◽

Sustainability Evaluation ◽

Analytic Hierarchy ◽

Food And Agriculture ◽

Food And Agriculture Organization ◽

Ecological Protection

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) launched the conservation initiative of the Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems (GIAHS) in 2002, providing a new solution to current global problems such as widening gap between rich and poor, environmental pollution, biodiversity destruction and degradation of agro-ecological functions. However, since the implementation of GIAHS, few studies have evaluated the role of GIAHS in regional sustainable development. To fill this research gap, this paper attempts to build an evaluation index system that integrates economic, social and environmental sustainability by matching the 169 subgoals and 232 indices of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with five FAO-GIAHS selection criteria and selecting the indices. The index weights are determined through Delphi method (expert scoring) and Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP). Then the GIAHS site of the Kuaijishan Ancient Chinese Torreya Community in Shaoxing City, Zhejiang Province is taken as an example for evaluation to enhance the empirical study. The results show that the comprehensive score for this heritage site is 77.90 points, of which economic, social and environmental sustainability scores 88.27, 86.12 and 69.71 points respectively, showing a descending trend. Thus, ecological protection of the Kuaijishan Ancient Chinese Torreya Community should be strengthened and be given prominence in the future. As for the contribution to further research, this SDGs-based GIAHS sustainability evaluation framework can serve as an important guide for assessing the approaches and effects of GIAHS in promoting the achievement of the SDGs. It can also be used for future international GIAHS sustainability assessment and comparison and provide a basis for adjusting the development model of GIAHS sites.

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Sustainable Agri-Food Systems: Environment, Economy, Society, and Policy

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su13116260 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (11) ◽

pp. 6260

Author(s):

Hamid El Bilali ◽

Carola Strassner ◽

Tarek Ben Hassen

Keyword(s):

Food Systems ◽

Food System ◽

Systems Approach ◽

Sustainability Assessment ◽

Developed Countries ◽

Future Research ◽

Environmental Aspects ◽

Four Dimensions ◽

Food And Agriculture ◽

Agriculture Systems

Agri-food systems (AFS) have been central in the debate on sustainable development. Despite this growing interest in AFS, comprehensive analyses of the scholarly literature are hard to find. Therefore, the present systematic review delineated the contours of this growing research strand and analyzed how it relates to sustainability. A search performed on the Web of Science in January 2020 yielded 1389 documents, and 1289 were selected and underwent bibliometric and topical analyses. The topical analysis was informed by the SAFA (Sustainability Assessment of Food and Agriculture systems) approach of FAO and structured along four dimensions viz. environment, economy, society and culture, and policy and governance. The review shows an increasing interest in AFS with an exponential increase in publications number. However, the study field is north-biased and dominated by researchers and organizations from developed countries. Moreover, the analysis suggests that while environmental aspects are sufficiently addressed, social, economic, and political ones are generally overlooked. The paper ends by providing directions for future research and listing some topics to be integrated into a comprehensive, multidisciplinary agenda addressing the multifaceted (un)sustainability of AFS. It makes the case for adopting a holistic, 4-P (planet, people, profit, policy) approach in agri-food system studies.

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