Citation: Kioumarsi, H., Sarsozo, M., & Pacheco, R. (2025). Food Systems and Policy: A Multidisciplinary and New Perspective. Research Communities by Springer Nature. https://communities.springernature.com/posts/food-systems-and-policy-a-multidisciplinary-and-new-perspective

Introduction

The United Nations has introduced a set of universal rules and regulations that apply to multiple sectors, including medical science, agriculture, and food industry. Food systems and policy are at the heart of addressing some of the most significant societal challenges facing our times, which include food insecurity, sustainable agriculture, food waste reduction, and the economic implications of organic food production. In fact, food insecurity remains a global challenge, aggravated by population growth, climate change, and socio-economic inequalities. Policies in food systems should address issues related to accessibility, availability, utilization, and stability of food supplies. International evidence from Food Policy Groups shows that policies that enable the strengthening of local food systems, school meal programs and procurement, for example, promote food equity and access, which adds to resilience. Food systems are complex networks that move food from production to consumption and exist at the nexus of nutrition, environment, and livelihood. The fragility and unequal nature of these systems have been all too evident in recent years, with conflict, climate extremes, and economic shocks fueling rising levels of acute food insecurity in multiple regions and underscoring the need for policy responses that integrate short-term emergency measures with structural reforms to production, distribution, and waste management.

Food insecurity

Food insecurity is a multidimensional concept. It results from insufficient availability, inadequate access, and a lack of utilization of nutritious food. The conflict, climate variability, and economic shocks, which inhibit purchasing power through inflation and currency crises, are all drivers at the macro level. Such economies depend on imported staples, and policy responses thus need to work across scales: social protection and targeted food assistance for the short-term protection of vulnerable households; investments in resilient local production and rural livelihoods to reduce dependence on imported staples; and market and regulatory reforms to keep food affordable. Social safety nets linked to nutrition, conditional cash transfers, school feeding programs, and focused subsidies, for example, can ease immediate harm with space for a longer agricultural transformation.

Sustainable Agriculture

Conservation agriculture, diversified crop rotations, agroecology, integrated pest management, and improved nutrient stewardship – all these are sustainable agricultural practices that can reduce environmental externalities while sustaining yields. Recent reviews emphasize that agriculture is both a casualty of climate change and a major contributor to greenhouse gas emissions; therefore, mitigation and adaptation need to be coordinated. Policies that re-align subsidies and incentives toward ecosystem services, such as payment for carbon sequestration or support to diversified rotations, are central to enabling adoption at scale. Very importantly, pathways to sustainability need to be context specific; what works for smallholder tropical systems will not work for, and may even be counterproductive for, temperate industrial systems.

Food waste

Reducing food waste is a practical, crosscutting strategy that simultaneously improves food availability, reduces emissions, and increases income. Accordingly, the global assessments and systematic reviews done by different scientists and organizations show that large proportions of edible food are either lost or wasted at different stages of supply chains, especially postharvest handling and storage in low- and middle-income countries, than at retail and consumer levels in higher-income countries. Interventions include investment in cold chains, better harvesting and storage techniques, date-label harmonization, retail-to-food-bank redistribution, and consumer awareness campaigns.

Organic food

Organic agriculture raises complex economic questions. Meta-analyses and empirical studies report that organic systems often exhibit lower yields per hectare for many crops but can be more profitable per hectare due to reduced input costs in some contexts and persistent price premiums in markets with sufficient consumer demand. Recent studies showed that, despite lower yields, organic farming can be financially competitive and offer environmental and social co-benefits; however, profitability depends on crop type, local input costs, market access, and policy supports. Scaling organic production without careful landscape planning may raise land-use pressures if yield gaps are not closed via diversifying systems and improving organic nutrient management. Thus, policies promoting organic agriculture need to pair market development (consumer education, reduced certification costs) with technical support to narrow yield gaps (diversification, soil fertility management) and targeted incentives that reflect ecosystem service values.

A resilient, low-waste, and equitable system

A coherent policy framework would bring together four pillars: (1) social protection and targeted emergency responses to reduce immediate hunger; (2) incentives and technical services to accelerate sustainable agricultural practices adapted to local contexts; (3) investments in supply-chain infrastructure and regulations to measurably reduce food loss and waste; and (4) market and regulatory policies to ensure fair returns to farmers and affordable nutritious diets for consumers, including consideration of the role of organic markets and potential subsidies or payment schemes for ecosystem services. Economically, the shift toward sustainable food systems can generate large net benefits, a healthier environment, and avoided damages, but requires redirecting subsidies, improving finance flows to smallholders, and strengthening local food systems to maintain access and affordability. Recent economic analyses indicate that investments in more sustainable food systems can yield high returns at the global level but require political will and coordinated policy packages.

Conclusions

Key research gaps include improved microdata on food loss versus waste across regions, long-term comparisons of economic outcomes under diversified and organic systems across climates, and integrated modeling linking household food security outcomes to supply-chain interventions. Policy must be evidence-driven, equitable, and flexible to local realities. Technical fixes alone will not end hunger unless paired with social policies that address affordability and access.

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