Circular Economy and Bioeconomy in Agricultural, Food and Forestry Systems: Perspectives for Sustainable Futures

Dear Colleagues,

In recent years, the circular economy has been steadily gaining ground as a potential alternative to the current linear economic paradigm, providing solutions to its main failures—from dramatic environmental deterioration, resource depletion, and climate change caused by the impact of unbridled human economic activities to widening social inequality gaps and poverty lock-in to low employment and exploitation.

In parallel, with similar intentions, the notion of a bioeconomy has been proposed by many as a necessary solution for the failings of the system, notably to eliminate the dependency on fossil-based and other non-renewable materials in manufacturing, construction, energy, food, and feed sectors. The bioeconomy proposes a strong vision in which our material needs, and to some extent, our energy needs will be covered by resources of biological origin. This would be supported by emerging biotechnologies and a new generation of biomaterials on the one hand and the availability of a vast amount of non-food biological resources from agriculture and forestry, including residues from primary production and downstream transformation by food and material value chains, on the other.

Yet, both opportunities are often exploited separately and in ways that are unsustainable from a systemic perspective: for example, one may think of circular water recovery in intensive sugarcane production in Brazil or unsustainable biotechnologies, such as first-generation genetically modified organisms applied in agriculture or even the biomass–energy–air pollution conundrum. Policymaking has thus far not been able to pave the way to full integration of the circular economy and bioeconomy. Even within those macro regions and countries that would likely be seen as the leaders of the green transition, some of the most recent policies do not seem to have effectively addressed the many barriers to integration.

At the same time, it is becoming clear that the current agricultural paradigm, based on simplified systems at the cropping, farming, and landscape scale and on the quest for increased yield through high use of chemical inputs and fossil fuels and seasonal exploitation of an unskilled labor force, is environmentally and socially unsustainable. Furthermore, this agricultural paradigm is not always economically viable in a context of increasingly globalized trade, and more often than not, it is counterproductive from a development perspective. This is further exacerbated by a mainstream food system promoting access to cheap food of scarce nutritional quality and resulting in widespread food wastage, high carbon and environmental footprints through long supply chains, and unfair prices paid to farmers. Similarly, the increasing demand for low priced forest resources can lead to unsustainable forest management, the expansion of intensively managed plantations and reforestation with exogenous fast-growing species and, paradoxically, interventions of deforestation of natural biodiverse forests in favor of highly productive plantations. In general terms, an increased demand for biological resources can induce undesirable land use changes and increase social conflicts in resource-rich regions.

The answers given by a very specialized and sectionalized community of academics, decisionmakers, and policymakers to the key questions of sustainability and resilience in the agriculture, food and forestry sectors have been fragmented and so far have not been able to address the problems convincingly in their complexity. Yet, the combined pressure of climate change and environmental degradation has reached a point where giving prompt, radical, and integrated policy answers based on robust evidence is not only desirable, but indispensable for survival.

Combining the concepts and approaches of the circular economy with those of bioeconomy offers a plethora of potential solutions, but very little effort has so far been made to circularize the bioeconomy in key systems, e.g., the agriculture, food, and forestry systems, and, in doing so, to adopt a systemic view centered on stakeholders. Such a systemic view integrates the circular economy and bioeconomy, puts the health and wellbeing of the stakeholders at the center, and takes into account the effects of the interactions between the different components of the system, the feedback loop, and the emerging properties in a sustainable and resilient manner.

This Special Issue aims to open a frank discussion within the communities of academia, research, policy- and decision-making, and entrepreneurs, to explore possible solutions to this conundrum with mid- and long-term perspectives in mind. We are looking for contributions that are interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary in nature and that explore how agricultural, food, and forestry systems could be redesigned on more sustainable bases by bringing together the circular economy with bioeconomy, keeping in mind the overall goal of improving the level of good and wellbeing of the population.

The perspective that we take is that of substantive research to support the development of innovative policies based on robust scientific evidence, taking into account the three pillars of sustainability (environmental, social, economic).

We welcome contributions from all the stakeholders, including academics, scholars, and researchers, as well as from policymakers, decisionmakers, entrepreneurs, practitioners, NGOs, and advocates of a sustainable future.

Themes

Circular economy and bioeconomy;
Business models for circular economy and bioeconomy in agriculture;
Case studies of successful transition to a circular economy model across:

• spatial scales (e.g., farm, landscape, district, regional, national, etc.)
• time scales (short-, mid-, long-term)
• enterprise and value chain scales (e.g., agricultural/forestry production, processing, consumption/use, public procurement);

Financial instruments, financial schemes, and other incentives for the circular economy;
Bottlenecks for the circular economy and bioeconomy and their integration;
Drivers, barriers, and enablers for the integration of the circular economy and bioeconomy in the agricultural, food, and forestry systems;
Sustainability priority area(s) of intervention (environmental, social, economic);
Communication and outreach;
Indicators of sustainability and resource use efficiency for the circular economy/bioeconomy;
Methodological approaches;
Participatory action research and citizen science;
Use of data and artificial intelligence to support the integration of circular economy and bioeconomy;
Definition, monitoring, reporting, and evaluation;
Key performance indicators;
Decision-making and decision support tools;
Health and wellbeing along the value chain and of consumers at large.

Dr. Corrado Topi
Prof. Paolo Bàrberi
Dr. Inazio Martines de Arano
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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• circular economy
• bioeconomy
• sustainability
• resilience
• green economy
• sustainable finance
• agriculture
• forestry
• food system
• systemic science
• drivers, barriers and enablers
• inter-disciplinary
• trans-disciplinary
• climate change
• environmental impact
• policy making
• decision-making
• environmental economics
• agroecology
• organic agriculture
• biodynamic agriculture
• supply chain
• value chain
• energy systems
• ecosystem service
• waste management
• recycling
• reusing
• AI and big data
• smart agriculture
• alternative agricultural systems