Resource Recovery and Valorisation from Agricultural Products and Wastes
Special Issue Editors
Interests: food sustainability; agricultural waste extraction; polysaccharide extraction; physicochemical characterisation; functional applications
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Interests: industrial ecology; waste management; circular economy; life cycle assessment
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
This Special Issue positions agricultural products and byproducts primarily as resources within circular, regional, and global systems. We seek contributions that characterise the availability, quality, spatial distribution, and seasonality of agri-resource stocks and flows; compare recovery pathways; and quantify how valorisation improves resource efficiency, security, and circularity across supply chains. Submissions should link extraction, separation, and purification explicitly to resource outcomes—for example, displaced virgin inputs, closed-loop nutrient cycling, solvent and energy recovery, avoided emissions and residues, water savings, land-use relief, and the equitable distribution of benefits to producers and communities.
We welcome studies on resource assessment and mapping (material flow analysis, mass/energy/exergy accounting, geospatial planning, logistics constraints), circular strategies and system design (cascade use, biorefinery integration, industrial symbiosis, modular and distributed processing), and metrics and decision tools (LCA, TEA, LCC, circularity indicators, planetary boundary alignment, risk and uncertainty analysis). Papers may address policy, governance, and market instruments—standards, procurement, EPR, certification, and finance—that enable diffusion and scale-up. We also encourage work demonstrating end-use performance and substitution (functional properties, durability, safety) with clear evidence of displaced fossil, mineral, or land-intensive resources.
Process innovations such as green/benign solvents, including deep eutectic and aqueous systems, supercritical fluids, membranes, adsorption and chromatography, and intensified or hybrid separations are in scope when framed by system-level impacts and scalability (solvent recyclability, energy integration, waste minimisation, safety and regulation, interoperability with existing agri-food infrastructure). Data papers, open models, and transparent inventories that support reproducibility and regional transferability are particularly encouraged. Additionally, analyses addressing equity and just transitions for smallholders and rural economies are encouraged.
Dr. Maria Dimopoulou
Dr. Athanasios Angelis Dimakis
Guest Editors
Dr. Antonia Vyrkou
Guest Editor Assistant
Manuscript Submission Information
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Keywords
- agricultural resource efficiency
- circular bioeconomy
- material flow analysis
- green separations
- biorefinery
- techno-economic and life-cycle assessment
- nutrient recovery
- industrial symbiosis
- policy and governance
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