Rethinking Food Systems: Circular Economy and Urban Agriculture

With increasing global environmental impacts and associated security issues of food production and consumption, securing sustainable and resilient food systems will require new approaches, innovations, techniques, and processes. In recent years, food production systems, especially those in urban areas, have seen great innovations and development. Distributed food production systems and urban agriculture have become increasingly salient as an approach to secure food supplies and reduce pressure on agricultural land and conventional supply chains.

However, urban food systems are dependent upon material and energy inputs, which often stem from sources outside the immediate region. With increasing pressure to reduce the environmental implications of their production and an increased interest in the circular economy, exploring approaches to reduce energy and resource consumption through further urban symbiotic developments are needed, Exploring the possibilities of employing urban residual streams, energy and the pre-conditions of their geographic proximity in new ways will become increasingly important.

Contributions to this topic should explore the convergence of urban agriculture, circular economy, and urban symbiosis. We therefore look forward to articles which approach this topic from different perspectives, including (but are not limited to):

• Circular economy approaches for food production in and around urban areas
• Urban agricultural system sustainability
• Urban symbiosis applications in food production
• Valorization pathways for food production by-products
• Novel approaches to use urban residual materials for food production
• Innovations and new business models in Agtech to promote circularity