Search Results (123)

To promote high-quality agricultural development and implement the “storing grain in the land” strategy, the construction of Well-Facilitated Farmland (WFF) plays a critical role in enhancing grain production capacity and optimizing the spatial distribution of food supply, thereby contributing to national food security. However, accurately assessing the potential impact of WFF construction on China’s grain production and regional self-sufficiency by 2030 remains a significant challenge. Existing studies predominantly focus on the provincial level, while fine-grained analyses at the city level are still lacking. This study quantifies the potential increase in grain production in China under the 2030 WFF construction target by employing effect size analysis, multi-weight prediction, and Monte Carlo simulation across multiple spatial scales (national, provincial, and city levels), thereby addressing the research gap at finer spatial resolutions. By integrating 2030 population projections and applying a grain self-sufficiency calculation formula, it further evaluates the contribution of WFF to regional grain self-sufficiency: (1) WFF could generate an additional 31–48 million tons of grain, representing a 5.26–8.25% increase; (2) grain supply in major crop-producing regions would expand, while the supply–demand gap in balanced regions would narrow; and (3) the number of cities with grain self-sufficiency ratios below 50% would decrease by 11.1%, while those exceeding 200% would increase by 25.5%. These findings indicate that WFF construction not only enhances overall grain production potential but also facilitates a transition from “overall supply-demand balance” to “structural security” within China’s food system. This study provides critical data support and policy insights for building a more resilient and regionally adaptive agricultural system. Full article

The Requisition–Compensation Balance of Cropland (RCBC) policy is important for ensuring food security. Previous studies have mainly focused on the quantity and quality of cropland when assessing the impacts of this policy. In terms of morphology, previous studies have primarily relied on landscape indicators. Therefore, this study aims to thoroughly analyze the impacts of the RCBC policy on the quality and morphology of cropland (especially morphological spatial pattern analysis, MSPA) in the Pearl River Delta (PRD) during 1996–2021. To this end, we constructed a comprehensive evaluation index system by combining MSPA, landscape indicators, and field research. The results show that the cropland quality in the PRD has exhibited a consistent improvement trend. High-quality cropland is spreading from central cities to the periphery, and the spatial distribution is becoming more even. Nonetheless, MSPA reveals an increasing trend of cropland fragmentation. The results indicate a decline in the area of the “core”, an increase in the area of the “island”, and a decrease in the connectivity of the cropland. Our field research confirms that the RCBC policy has indirectly exacerbated cropland fragmentation. In many regions of the PRD, the fragmentation of cropland hinders the application of agricultural mechanization and increases the cost of cultivation, resulting in severe cropland abandonment. Therefore, local governments should implement rigorous planning and prioritize cropland morphology when compensating cropland. Our findings are expected to provide empirical evidence for improving the RCBC policy and protecting cropland. Full article

Rapid urbanization, climate variability, and land degradation are increasingly challenging traditional open-field farming systems. Soilless farming (SLF) has emerged as a complementary approach to enhance horticultural resilience in space-constrained and climate-stressed environments. This review critically evaluates the role of SLF within the broader framework of climate-smart agriculture (C-SA), with a particular focus on its applications in urban and peri-urban settings. Drawing on a systematic review of the existing literature, the study explores how SLF technologies contribute to efficient resource use, localized food production, and environmental sustainability. By decoupling crop cultivation from soil, SLF enables precise control over nutrient delivery and water use in enclosed environments, such as vertical farms, greenhouses, and container-based units. These systems offer notable advantages regarding water conservation, increased yield per unit area, and adaptability to non-arable or degraded land, making them particularly relevant for high-density cities, arid zones, and climate-sensitive regions. SLF systems are categorized into substrate-based (e.g., coco peat and rock wool) and water-based systems (e.g., hydroponics, aquaponics, and aeroponics), each with distinct design requirements, nutrient management strategies, and crop compatibility. Emerging technologies—including artificial intelligence, the Internet of Things, and automation—further enhance SLF system efficiency through real-time data monitoring and precision control. Despite these advancements, challenges remain. High setup costs, energy demands, and the need for technical expertise continue to limit large-scale adoption. While SLF is not a replacement for traditional agriculture, it offers a strategic supplement to bolster localized food systems and address climate-related risks in horticultural production. Urban horticulture is no longer a peripheral activity; it is becoming an integral element of sustainable urban development. SLF should be embedded within broader resilience strategies, tailored to specific socioeconomic and environmental contexts. Full article

Current food systems provide relative food security but compromise planetary health and largely fail to address climate change challenges. Regional food supplies can contribute to sustainable production and consumption, reducing the dependence on global supply chains. However, food systems’ complexity and rigidity hinder the implementation of climate-conscious, healthier practices. The City.Food.Basket project explored regional food baskets in urban and peri-urban settings in Austria for the City of Graz and its surroundings, developing models for regional, healthy, and low-climate-impact diets. Against this background, we present a qualitative study that generated three explorative scenarios for promoting regional diets using a Delphi-based expert-stakeholder survey method with participatory elements. A scenario workshop elaborated on interconnecting actions to strengthen regional food supply, including making regional food a tender criterion, reducing waste, ensuring affordability, and shifting subsidies to climate-conscious practices for Graz. While the method successfully provides socio-technical futures for policy orientation, its direct policy impact remains low due to time constraints, short project duration, limited project resources, and differing rationalities between research and policymaking. This study highlights the need for improved connectivity between transdisciplinary research, foresight methods, and regional policy cycles to enhance such projects’ effectiveness. Full article

(1) Background: In recent years, meat alternatives, including plant-based and animal cell-cultured meat, have attracted substantial interest among Chinese food science researchers and consumers, prompting considerable debate; (2) Methods: This study utilizes qualitative research methods, specifically focus group interviews with 59 participants across five administrative regions and seven cities in China, to explore consumer knowledge, perceptions, and potential acceptance of meat substitutes; (3) Results: The findings reveal that Chinese consumers generally exhibit a low level of understanding of new meat substitutes, particularly animal cell-cultured meat. Although participants acknowledge the potential environmental, resource-saving, and animal welfare benefits associated with meat substitutes, they also express concerns about perceived risks, such as artificial taste, high costs, market monopolization, diminished consumer welfare, and adverse impacts on traditional animal husbandry and employment. Despite a willingness to try meat substitutes, the regular purchase and consumption of these remain limited. The acceptance of meat substitutes is influenced by factors including personal characteristics, price, safety, and the authenticity of taste; (4) Conclusions: The study concludes that legislative support, technological advancements in production and regulation, price reductions, and the establishment of a robust traceability system may enhance consumer confidence and acceptance of meat substitutes in China. Full article

This paper addresses the dual challenges of food security and sustainable development by examining the balance between arable land quality and economic development. Coordinating and optimizing development models is essential for achieving sustainable agricultural and economic progress. The North Slope Economic Belt of Tianshan Mountain (UANST), a semi-arid agriculturalpastoral transition zone in northwest China, exemplifies a coupled human environment system where global sustainability targets confront regional development imperatives. Focusing on seven cities and counties within the UANST, this study employs information sensitivity indicators to quantitatively select evaluation metrics. It provides a comprehensive analysis of the current state of the coupling and coordination degree (CCD) between arable land quality and economic development in the region. Using a system dynamics model (SDM), four scenario models were developed to predict and analyze the interaction between cultivated land quality and economic development on the North Slope of Tianshan. The study proposes a model to improve coordination between cultivated land quality and economic development. The key findings are as follows: (1) “preliminary screening + information sensitivity analysis” method identified 12 arable land quality evaluation indicators and 11 economic development evaluation indicators for the North Slope Economic Belt of Tianshan. (2) The coupling coordination between arable land quality and economic development in the seven counties and cities improved from 0.469 to 0.663, reflecting a transition from “marginal imbalance” to “primary coordination”. By 2021, all regions had reached the initial stage of coordinated development. (3) Among the development models analyzed, the coordinated development model achieved the highest coupling coordination score (0.9136). This model also demonstrated lower carbon dioxide emissions and reduced water resource consumption, alleviating environmental pressures and offering an optimal solution for regional coordinated development. Full article

Community Restaurants (CRs), part of the Brazilian government’s Popular Restaurant Program (PRP), provide free and/or affordable nutritionally balanced meals as an essential strategy to meet the most vulnerable population’s basic needs and rights. This cross-sectional study evaluated the effectiveness of these CRs’ proposed objectives in cities with ≥100,000 inhabitants in Brazil’s northern and northeastern regions—Brazil’s most vulnerable and historically unequal regions. Effectiveness was assessed using a CR evaluation matrix-based indicator system to classify CRs as “not very effective”, “effective”, or “very effective”. Among the 94 CRs assessed (north: n = 23, 24.5%; northeast: n = 71, 75.5%), most were classified as “effective” or “very effective”, except for the northern states of Amapá and Tocantins, whose only CR was rated as “not very effective” and the northeastern state of Sergipe, which had a PR considered “not very effective”. State-operated CRs predominated (north: 82.6%; northeast: 76.1%) and primarily operated Monday to Friday (north: 87.0%; northeast: 59.2%), with 35.2% of the northeast CRs operating daily, serving lunch as the main meal (100%). Average daily meal counts were 486.5 (north) and 926.9 (northeast), and the average meal offering time was from 10:55 am to 1:21 pm in the north and from 10:35 am to 2:00 pm in the northeast region, with costs averaging USD 0.27 and USD 0.20, respectively. All CRs employed a nutritionist as a technical manager responsible for menu planning and demonstrated compliance with essential infrastructure criteria, including regular waste collection, water supply, and proximity to public transport. Most were in areas with sanitary sewage coverage (north: 91.3%; northeast: 98.6%) and had monitoring mechanisms (91.3% north; 94.4% northeast) and prioritization systems for vulnerable populations (north: 73.9%; northeast: 80.0%). These findings indicate that CRs in these regions effectively strive to address food security goals, demonstrating tangible outcomes that benefit society. Full article

The synergistic relation among land resources, water resources, and food production plays a crucial role in sustainable agricultural development. This research constructs a coupling coordination assessment system of the land–water–food (LWF) nexus from 2005 to 2020 for 31 provinces (municipal cities, autonomous regions) in China, and explores the current development status of land, water, and food systems at multiple scales as well as the coupling coordination characteristics of the LWF nexus. The exploring spatial data analysis and spatial Tobit model are used to explain the spatial correlations and influencing factors of coupling coordination development on the LWF nexus. On that basis, the gray GM (1,1) model is used to forecast the future development of the LWF nexus in China. The results show that the comprehensive development indexes of the land system, water system, food system, and LWF nexus are on the rise, but the land system lags behind the water system and food system. The coupling coordination degree of the LWF nexus in different regions ranges from 0.538 to 0.754, and the coupling coordination development of the LWF nexus in China has reached the preliminary coupled coordination type, with an evolutionary process similar to that of its comprehensive development level. Further empirical research shows that there is a significant positive spatial correlation between coupling coordination development levels for the LWF nexus in China. The level of urbanization and agricultural industry agglomeration have negative effects, while economic development, ecological environment, and scientific and technological progress have positive effects. The prediction results indicate that the coupling coordination degree of the LWF nexus in China will show a stable upward trend from 2024 to 2025, and most provinces will reach the intermediate coupled coordination type in 2025. This study can inform decision-making for policy-makers and practitioners and enrich the knowledge hierarchy of the LWF nexus’ sustainable development on the national and regional scales. Full article

Background: The organic sector is often suggested as a lever with a potential for contributing to the three dimensions of sustainability: social, environmental, and economic. This study aims to investigate selected organic initiatives and organic food sectors in different locations, such as capital cities, rural areas, and the bio-district in SysOrg project consortium, in the Warsaw municipality in Poland, North Hessia region in Germany, Cilento bio-district in Italy, Kenitra province in Morocco, and Copenhagen municipality in Denmark to uncover the diverse drivers, barriers, and entry points to enable a transformation process to resilient and sustainable organic food systems. Methods: Following the methodology of the SysOrg project, this study relied on the following mixed data collection methods: quantitative (a household survey distributed among citizens) and qualitative (semi-structured interviews with organized initiatives). Results: The results demonstrate that, despite being in different stages of development in the investigated territories, the organic sector is challenged by similar barriers (e.g., undeveloped market, regulatory/budgetary constraints, and lack of knowledge and awareness) and benefits from analogous drivers (e.g., awareness and education, community support, and incentives). Conclusions: Those similarities, but also analyses of their differences and origins, allowed us to establish critical entry points for the development of a sustainable organic food system, e.g., promoting organics through a top-down approach, providing training and education, reducing information delay, popularizing negative feedback, strengthening the effectiveness of a given incentives scheme by tailored nudging mechanisms, establishing country/regional specific traditional frames, making the system more inclusive, building organic communities, and awareness-building. Full article

Consumers’ increasing concern for their health, the environment, and ethical aspects of food production has generated a growing demand for organic and local produce. Specific information on consumer preferences, at the regional and product level, is necessary for producers to make better decisions. To investigate consumer preferences and their willingness to pay a premium for locally produced and organic walnut systems, we used a discrete choice experiment. Data were collected using face-to-face questionnaires from a representative sample of 501 walnut consumers from the main cities of Puebla, Mexico. The results showed heterogeneous preferences for different types of walnuts, with higher marginal utility and willingness to pay a premium for locally produced and organic nuts. However, lower preference was identified for the latter, with respect to locally produced nuts. Potential buyers of nuts were people under 40 years of age, with a monthly income of more than EUR 1500, and environmental advocates. Our findings provide producers, sellers, and policy makers with useful information that can guide them in developing successful market segmentation, communication, and pricing strategies for the walnut production and marketing. Full article

Research into the resilience of the water-energy-food-ecology (WEFE) system is of great significance to ensure the safety and high quality of resources in the Yellow River Basin. To investigate WEFE system resilience and its influencing factors, this paper constructs an indicator system for WEFE system resilience based on prefecture-level city data from the Yellow River Basin spanning the years 2008 to 2021, and explores its dynamic evolution. Furthermore, this paper employs the Partial Least Squares (PLS) regression model to explore the factors influencing WEFE system resilience. It utilizes a spatial panel model to investigate the spatial spillover effects of these factors. The results indicate that WEFE system resilience in the Yellow River Basin exhibits a fluctuating upward trend. Spatially, a pattern of “low in the middle and upstream regions, high in the downstream regions” emerges. Among the driving factors, infrastructure development and the degree of innovation exhibit negative spatial spillover effects, while other factors demonstrate positive spatial spillover effects. Therefore, integrated basin management needs to be promoted by considering the systematic interlinkages of water, energy, food production and ecology and the sustainable use of resources to ensure the long-term resilience of cities. These findings provide valuable insights for policymakers to formulate more effective and coordinated resource management strategies in the Yellow River Basin, and also contributes to enriching the international literature on WEFE system research. Full article

Global urbanization has caused enormous challenges that seriously threaten ecological security and the food system. Thus, there is a need for finding an optimal solution for the eco-efficiency of cultivated land use (ECLU) that can promote the development of new-type urbanization, while ensuring the sustainable utilization of limited cultivated-land resources. The quantitative system of multi-scale ECLU used in existing studies is inadequate; it is necessary to establish a measurement system from the perspective of geographical spatial relationship that uses evaluation as a key basis for management. In this study, we considered the Changchun Metropolitan Area and a representative urban–rural transition area as the target regions and customized new ECLU evaluation systems for different scales. The super slack-based measure and gravity and social network analyses methods were applied to evaluate the ECLU and explore the structural characteristics of its spatial association network. The average ECLU value for the Changchun Metropolitan Area was 0.974; the results indicated that most of the study area was eco-efficient. The value of ECLU for the urban–rural transition area varied from 0.022 to 1.323; thus, the highly efficient cultivated land was mainly distributed around the urban built-up area. The spatial association network of ECLU revealed that the overall spatial correlations were relatively weak, with a significant “bipolar” division of ECLU; furthermore, the network hierarchy and stability needed improvement. Moreover, we noted distant attraction capacity and siphoning effects outside regional boundaries. In the Changchun Metropolitan Area, it manifested as a monocentric radiation, with Changchun City as the center. In the urban–rural transition area, the cultivated land in proximity to the newly built urban area was more likely to experience spatial spillover. These findings have important implications for strengthening land-use management and advancing sustainable agricultural development for new-type urbanization. Our study can be used by policymakers and stakeholders to design sustainable urban cities, while improving land-use management and optimizing resource use. Full article

Water scarcity is a critical barrier to sustainable food production and food security. To address this issue, China introduced a pilot policy for water rights trading in 2014. Using panel data from 29 provinces (cities and districts) in China from 2006 to 2022, this paper investigates the impact of the water rights trading policy on food security and explores its underlying mechanisms through the DID model. It is found that (1) the water rights trading policy substantially boosts food production in pilot areas and mitigates the effects of water scarcity on food security. (2) The water rights trading policy enhances food security by advancing water-saving irrigation technology and optimizing crop-planting structures. (3) The impact of the water rights trading policy proves more pronounced in areas with lower water use efficiency and higher food production potential. Therefore, it is recommended that the government continue advancing the water rights trading policy and adjust it dynamically based on regional differences. Additionally, strengthening guidance on water-saving irrigation technologies and optimizing cropping structures will further enhance the adaptive capacity of the agricultural system, helping to ensure food security. Full article

Research on water–energy–food security is crucial for ensuring the sustainable development of human society. Building on the water–energy–food theory and resilience concepts, a novel perspective termed “resilience security” was proposed. This differs from traditional approaches focused on coordination security and efficiency security. An indicator evaluation system consisting of 29 indicators was developed. Panel data from 2009 to 2022 in 40 cities across Shandong, Shanxi, Henan, and Shaanxi Provinces along the Yellow River were used to assess local water–energy–food resilience security. The nine external driving factors were empirically analyzed in different provinces using a spatial Durbin model. The findings indicate that: (1) over the 14-year period, the water––energy–food resilience security of the sample transitioned from a near-exposure state to an initial resistance state; and (2) over the 14-year period, administrative power, market power, resource flow capacity, population density, industrial structure, urbanization level, scientific and technological inputs, environmental governance inputs, and spatial geographic factors significantly influenced regional water–energy–food resilience security, with notable variations across provinces. Full article

This paper presents the development and testing of an impact assessment tool for the Cities2030 project aimed at transforming city-region food systems to align with the European Union’s Food2030 policy and the European Green Deal. This study highlights the importance of sustainable urban food systems, focusing on food security, environmental sustainability, and public health. Using a design thinking approach, this research emphasizes co-creation, stakeholder engagement, and iterative refinement, developing a flexible, multi-dimensional framework adaptable to diverse city-region contexts. Through collaboration with 65 stakeholders, this tool was tailored to meet the socio-economic and environmental needs of different regions. Case studies from Cities2030 partner cities demonstrate its effectiveness in fostering cross-sectoral collaboration, enhancing community participation, and driving food system innovations. Key findings reveal measurable impacts across social, environmental, and economic dimensions, while addressing challenges like regional disparities in data collection and the need for improved long-term tracking of sustainability metrics. This study concludes by underscoring the role of adaptive, inclusive strategies in assessing urban food systems’ sustainability and resilience and suggests that the tool’s framework could be applied to other urban sustainability areas, such as energy and water management. Full article