Thomas P. Tomich, Founder, Food Systems Lab, and Ohio State's Casey Hoy to co-edit forthcoming Special Collection of Sustainability: "Smart & Connected Regional Food Systems".

PUBLISHED ARTICLES:

"PestOn: An Ontology to Make Pesticides Information Easily Accessible and Interoperable"
  by: Marco Medici, Damion Dooley, and Maurizio Canavari
  Sustainability 2022, 14(11), 6673; https://doi.org/10.3390/su14116673 - 30 May 2022

"Design and Implementation of a Workshop for Evaluation of the Role of Power in Shaping and Solving Challenges in a Smart Foodshed"
  by: Ayaz Hyder, Angela Blatt, Allan D. Hollander, Casey Hoy, Patrick R. Huber, Matthew C. Lange, James F. Quinn, Courtney M. Riggle, Ruth Sloan, and Thomas P. Tomich
  Sustainability 2022, 14(5), 2642; https://doi.org/10.3390/su14052642 - 24 Feb 2022

"Exploring Social Media Data to Understand How Stakeholders Value Local Food: A Canadian Study Using Twitter"
  by:  Marilyne Chicoine, Francine Rodier, Fabien Durif, Sandra Schillo, and Laurette Dubé
  Sustainability 2021, 13(24), 13920; https://doi.org/10.3390/su132413920 - 16 Dec 2021

"Early Ethical Assessment: An Application to the Sustainability of Swine Body Scanners"
  by: Paul B. Thompson, Laurie Thorp, Blake L. Ginsburg, Tabitha Maria Zivku, and Madonna Benjamin
  Sustainability 2021, 13(24), 14003; https://doi.org/10.3390/su132414003 - 18 Dec 2021
 

ACCEPTING MANUSCRIPTS FOR PUBLICATION THROUGHOUT 2022:

Click here to submit an article for consideration

Collection Information

Focus, scope and purpose:  Interest in where food comes from and how it is produced, processed, and distributed has increased over the last few decades in industrialized nations. Mounting evidence and experience point to profound disturbing weaknesses in our food systems’ abilities to support human livelihoods and wellbeing, and alarming long-term trends regarding both the environmental footprint of food systems and mounting vulnerabilities to shocks and stressors. Addressing these weaknesses in food systems could open key opportunities to leverage inclusive, equitable, sustainable, and resilient growth in economic, social and natural capitals. The focus of this special issue is a growing wave of innovations that hold potential to address the underlying deficiencies in data and analytical capabilities that inhibit innovation in and sustainable transformation of our food systems. The scope of the SI spans computation, informatics, and data science innovations in network engagement, analytics, and translation to enable equitable access to better data and assessment capabilities for use by food system actors and advocates, and to facilitate co-creation of innovative solutions. Topics may include new conceptualizations and applied use cases employing innovative information exchange standards (including ontologies, controlled vocabularies, and data schemas), decentralized data infrastructures, knowledge graphs derived from use cases of food system challenges and opportunities, generalized workflows, legal frameworks and data governance standards, and user interfaces (UI/UX), as components of an intelligent food system. The overarching purpose is to enhance equity, sustainability, and resilience through collaborative, user-driven experimentation within complex food systems, supported by diverse agroecosystems, circular economies, and equity-based cultural norms.

Relationship to existing literature: There are studies that take a partial approach to these opportunities, covering some aspects (economic, environmental, or social) but missing others, thereby failing to provide a comprehensive framework for food system sustainability and resilience. Among these, some use top-down, static approaches, while those that are more innovative in data science tend to be proprietary, and hence exclusive (and unpublished). We emphasize articles that take an open approach to data, seek interoperability among linked data and tools, and strive for holistic, comprehensive, and dynamic approaches to challenges and opportunities to support food system sustainability. This encompasses tools for systems analysis as well as community engagement, incubation of entrepreneurship, and legal aspects of data sharing (IP, privacy, and data ethics).