Special Issue "Reducing Food Loss and Waste at the Farm Level: Seeking Sustainable Path to Food Security"

A special issue of Agriculture (ISSN 2077-0472). This special issue belongs to the section "Agricultural Economics, Policies and Rural Management".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 20 November 2023 | Viewed by 3213

Special Issue Editors

Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics, University of Georgia, Griffin, GA 30223-1797, USA
Interests: agricultural and food economics; consumer choice and behavior; environmental economics
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Management Information Systems, Bilecik Seyh Edebali University, Bilecik 11100, Turkey
Interests: agricultural economics; production economics; consumer demand analysis; agribusiness management; econometrics; statistics; time series analysis; health economics; environmental and resource economics
Academy of Global Food Economics and Policy, Beijing Food Safety and Strategy Research Base, College of Economics and Management, China Agricultural University, Beijing 100083, China
Interests: environmental economics; sustainable agricultural development; food economics
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Food losses and food waste remain high and display high variation across food categories in rural households, household locations in various economic zones, and different cultures. Plant-based foods account for a sizable share of both waste and loss, suggesting that the path to reduce waste may vary with food category. Fruits and vegetables account for a relatively higher waste and loss share than other plant foods. Factors aggravating the situation include inadequate storage facilities, an insufficient logistical infrastructure needed to move crops to consumption centers, and processing capacity, as well as the natural attributes of the crop. Food loss and waste represent wasted resources, including water and land, compared to if farmers could produce in an environmentally sustainable way, particularly if supplied with new-bred, improved varieties.

Food loss and waste avoidance make the choice of crops, farming techniques, and technology location-specific, as the variations in weather patterns suggest climate adaptation as an alternative path to food insecurity mitigation. The ability of rural communities to raise food but their failure to protect it post-harvest handling implies the need for education and training, especially for limited-resource farmers, and stakeholders within the supply chain, to minimize food loss and waste.

Prof. Dr. Wojciech Florkowski
Prof. Dr. Abdulbaki Bilgic
Dr. Ting Meng
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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Keywords

  • food waste
  • food loss
  • small enterprise
  • small farmer
  • consumer behavior
  • sustainability
  • input waste
  • food (in)security

Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

Article
How Much Food Loss and Waste Do Countries with Problems with Food Security Generate?
Agriculture 2023, 13(5), 966; https://doi.org/10.3390/agriculture13050966 - 27 Apr 2023
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 2503
Abstract
Worldwide, the number of people suffering from hunger is around 702 and 828 million, and 2.3 billion people have moderate or severe food insecurity. This situation is striking, considering that the vast amount of food discarded globally equals 1.3 billion tons annually. For [...] Read more.
Worldwide, the number of people suffering from hunger is around 702 and 828 million, and 2.3 billion people have moderate or severe food insecurity. This situation is striking, considering that the vast amount of food discarded globally equals 1.3 billion tons annually. For this reason, in 2015, world leaders agreed to a global agenda for 2030, adopting the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Among its objectives, are to fight against poverty, hunger, and gender inequality worldwide and achieve environmental sustainability. With this framework, this article uses a top-down mass balance approach to calculate food loss and waste (FLW) by country’s food security level. In addition, it explores the causes of FLW and its impacts on natural resources, climate change, food security, and the SDGs in countries with a weak and moderate level of food security. The estimated global FLW was 1498 million tons of food in 2017. The most food discarded was concentrated in countries with good food security, 894.3 million tons. In contrast, the lowest food discard occurred in countries with a weak level of food security, 11.4 million tons. The primary outcome of this paper is to establish a link between the levels of food security and food loss in different countries, which may serve as a guide for the design of specific public policies. Full article
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