Automated food intake tracking requires depth-refined semantic segmentation to rectify visual-volume discordance in long-term care homes

Malnutrition is a multidomain problem affecting 54% of older adults in long-term care (LTC). Monitoring nutritional intake in LTC is laborious and subjective, limiting clinical inference capabilities. Recent advances in automatic image-based food estimation have not yet been evaluated in LTC settings. Here, we describe a fully automatic imaging system for quantifying food intake. We propose a novel deep convolutional encoder-decoder food network with depth-refinement (EDFN-D) using an RGB-D camera for quantifying a plate’s remaining food volume relative to reference portions in whole and modified texture foods. We trained and validated the network on the pre-labelled UNIMIB2016 food dataset and tested on our two novel LTC-inspired plate datasets (689 plate images, 36 unique foods). EDFN-D performed comparably to depth-refined graph cut on IOU (0.879 vs. 0.887), with intake errors well below typical 50% (mean percent intake error: $$-4.2$$ - 4.2 %). We identify how standard segmentation metrics are insufficient due to visual-volume discordance, and include volume disparity analysis to facilitate system trust. This system provides improved transparency, approximates human assessors with enhanced objectivity, accuracy, and precision while avoiding hefty semi-automatic method time requirements. This may help address short-comings currently limiting utility of automated early malnutrition detection in resource-constrained LTC and hospital settings.

Jenis Dan Struktur Tropik Level Ikan Di Danau Tempe Kabupaten Soppeng Propinsi Sulawesi Selatan

Penelitian berjudul Jenis dan Struktur Trofik Level Ikan di Danau Tempe Kabupaten Soppeng Propinsi Sulawesi Selatan yang dilakukan selama 4 bulan penelitian (Februari, maret, April dan Juni) tahun 2017, bertujuan untuk mengetahui transfer energy di perairan Danau tempe berjalan sesuai dengan sistem jejaring makanan dan manfaat penelitian ini untuk pengelolaan dan pemanfaatan sumber daya ikan yang optimal dan berkelanjutan diperairan Danau Tempe. Hasil penelitian menujukkan bahwa struktur trifik level Beberapa ikan yang tertangkap di perairan Danau Tempe adalah minimum 2 dan maksimum berfarisasi menurut jenis ikan dan waktu pengamatan. Disimpulkan bahwa sumberdaya alam diperairan danau tempe berupa fitoplankton dan zooplankton sebagai produser primer dan consumer primer masih mendukung untuk tingkatan trofik diatasnya yaitu ikan South Sulawesi, which was conducted for 4 months of research (February, March, April and June) in 2017, aims to determine the transfer of energy in the waters of Lake Tempe runs according to the food network system and the benefits of this research for optimal and sustainable management and utilization of fish resources. in the waters of Lake Tempe. The results showed that the trific level structure of some fish caught in the waters of Lake Tempe was a minimum of 2 and a maximum of varying according to the type of fish and the time of observation. It was concluded that the natural resources in the waters of Lake Tempe in the form of phytoplankton and zooplankton as primary producers and primary consumers still support the higher trophic levels, namely fish.

Trade of economically and physically scarce virtual water in the global food network

The virtual water (VW) trade associated to food is composed by the quantity of water utilized for the production of the crops exchanged on the global market. In assessing a country’s water abundance or scarcity when entering the international VW trade, scholars consider only physical water availability, neglecting economic water scarcity, which indicates situations in which socio-economic obstacles impede the productive use of water. We weight the global VW trade associated to primary crops with a newly proposed composite water scarcity index (CWSI) that combines physical and economic water scarcity. 39% of VW volumes is exported from countries with a higher CWSI than the one of the destination country. Such unfair routes occur both from low- to high-income countries and among low- and middle-income countries themselves. High-income countries have a predominant role in import of CWSI-weighted VW, while low- and middle-income countries dominate among the largest CWSI-weighted VW exporters. For many of them economic water scarcity dominates over physical scarcity. The application of the CWSI elicits also a status change from net exporter to net importer for some wealthy countries and viceversa for some low- and middle-income countries. The application of CWSI allows one to quantify to what extent VW exchanges flow along environmentally and economically unfair routes, and it can inform the design of compensation policies.

Community-supported agriculture (CSA): significance and prospects for growth for individuals, communities, and food systems.

Community-supported agriculture (CSA) is an alternative way of supplying food based on direct interaction between producers and consumers. As an alternative food network (AFN) and a form of civic agriculture, it is considered a more sustainable way of food production and consumption compared to the conventional food system. The number of CSA initiatives has been increasing in the last few decades worldwide parallel to growing scholarly debates about its usefulness, viability and potential. This article contributes to the review of the following: The impacts of CSA on individuals and communities, including motives for involvement and benefits received; the impacts of CSA on food systems, particularly on sustainability; and the barriers and opportunities for CSA growth. We conclude that CSA addresses the needs for sustainable and ecologically sound food and contributes to community building by reconnecting urban and rural places and people with their food. It is also an active position against the unsustainable dominant food systems and shows a different way of caring for the planet and the people. However, in order to grow, CSA needs to overcome certain barriers, namely financial difficulties, unrealistic member expectations and the need for social justice by providing livelihoods for the farmers and becoming more inclusive in terms of race, income and gender. The COVID-19 crisis presented an opportunity for CSA to become more effective as the CSA initiatives demonstrated resilience during lockdowns and the demand for their products increased.

Radionuclides in marine and terrestrial ecosystems of the North European region

The paper presents an analysis of the radioecological state of the terrestrial ecosystems in north european part of the Russia, which were exposed to the a products of the Chernobyl accident. The analysis of the state of marine and terrestrial objects included in the food network of the population and forming the dose of internal radiation of the population of the Murmansk region is given. Comparative estimates of the effects of global radionuclide deposition in the North-European territory are given.

ROA CLUJ: REKO TYPE SUSTAINABLE MARKETING NETWORK IN ROMANIA

The trend of sustainable consumption induces a change in the marketing strategies, applying a marketing type that promotes the culture of quality, and employs the principles of eco-rationality in choosing the tools of interaction with the consumers. The originally Finnish REKO (abbreviation of the Swedish “Rejäl Konsumtion”, meaning “Fair Consumption”) model of alternative food network (AFN) is a perfect example of implementing the principles of sustainable marketing. This survey focuses on ROA (Roade Online din Ardeal; Fruits/Harvest from Transylvania online), a REKO type direct marketing network, based in Cluj -Napoca, Romania. The aim of the study is to assess the chances and challenges of this type of AFN in the Romanian context. For this, we analyse the opportunities and impediments of development, and the cost and benefits of the AFN for the involved producers. The objective of the survey is to reveal the potential contribution of AFNs to sustainable production, marketing, and distribution of local products. The applied qualitative research is based on (1) an interview with a coordinator of the investigated initiative, (2) a survey among the involved producers, (3) participant observation as consumer, (4) informal discussions with the AFN stakeholders , and (5) secondary data analysis . As conclusions, we can state that Romania holds significant resources for the implementation of AFNs due to numerous favourable circumstances, such as the rising demand for qualitative local and regional products, and the willingness of consumers and producers to get involved in direct marketing networks. However, grassroot initiatives of direct marketing face administrative and legal challenges. The lack of real support of public policies, the weakly developed idea of self-government, and not firmly established in practice, confine the short food supply chains to a niche phenomenon.

Microstructural Characteristics of the Weighted and Directed International Crop Trade Networks

With increasing global demand for food, international food trade is playing a critical role in balancing the food supply and demand across different regions. Here, using trade datasets of four crops that provide more than 50% of the calories consumed globally, we constructed four international crop trade networks (iCTNs). We observed the increasing globalization in the international crop trade and different trade patterns in different iCTNs. The distributions of node degrees deviate from power laws, and the distributions of link weights follow power laws. We also found that the in-degree is positively correlated with the out-degree, but negatively correlated with the clustering coefficient. This indicates that the numbers of trade partners affect the tendency of economies to form clusters. In addition, each iCTN exhibits a unique topology which is different from the whole food network studied by many researchers. Our analysis on the microstructural characteristics of different iCTNs provides highly valuable insights into distinctive features of specific crop trades and has potential implications for model construction and food security.

Revitalization of Food in Sweden—A Closer Look at the REKO Network

Can parts of the future food system include bi-weekly opportunities to purchase uneven stocks of produce at semi-remote locations? Current development in the Swedish food system suggests so. In the last few years, the Swedish Alternative Food Network ‘REKO’ has grown at an explosive pace. This anthropological article describes and discusses the organizational structure and motivations of the network, as well as discusses it from a revitalization perspective. From a netnographical and policy analysis perspective it is shown how the network uses social media and policy to convey a low bureaucracy, end to end, commercial space for local food—understood as a more “simple” way to achieve direct relationships in the food supply chain and thus create opportunities for local food networks. By adopting a view of the conventions and values of this Alternative Food Network as representing a parallel system aiming at facilitating direct relationships between ends in the food supply chain, the REKO initiative can be understood as a feasible model for a more satisfactory culture without needing to replace the mainstream food supply. The findings of the research deepen the understanding of REKO in Sweden by pointing towards how it can be understood as a sign of change of consumer preference and of prioritization of official policy concerns. The article also points towards how grass root movements can replicate success rapidly using policy documents capturing experiences and best practices spread online through social media.