Working groups
WG: 1 work on the scientific concepts, frameworks including scientific papers and models and guidelines for the practise.
WG 2: gathering together examples of OFS around the world and coordinating existing and new case studies.
Contact: Carola Strassner, Johannes Kahl
Collection of OFSP involved Projects
Ongoing projects:
SysOrg: Organic agro- food systems as models for sustainable food systems in Europe and Northern Africa
Partner countries: Denmark, Poland, Italy, Germany and Morocco
Time frame: 1st January 2021 – 31st December 2023
Goal: SysOrg will result in improved and locally adapted strategies and tools for transformation to sustainable, resilient and resource efficient food systems with less environmental impact and high socio-cultural acceptance.
Description: SysOrg identifies how pathways to increase sustainable food production and consumption can be successfully designed. This requires a better understanding of food systems, including the multitude of actors involved and the identification of critical points within systems.
This is done by mapping and analysing five case territories (Copenhagen, Cilento, North Hessia, Warsaw, Kenitra) in a transdisciplinary way.
Website: https://susfood-db-era.net/main/SysOrg (own website will follow)
Coordination:
Dr. Ulrike Eberle, University of Kassel, Germany
INSUM: Research project: Indicators for assessment of health effects of consumption of sustainable organic school meals in Eco Regions
Partner countries: Germany, Denmark and Poland
Time frame: February 2021 – January 2023
Goal: INSUM project aims to create a network of experts in the field of school meals, nutrition, organic food and diets, child health and other relevant areas, to define the most suitable indicators to be used for future research aiming at assessing diet and health in Ecoregions focusing on sustainable, organic production and consumption.
Description: The team will organize 2 international workshops, with invited experts, followed by the development and publication of the workshop proceedings with consensus statements and guidelines. School meal programs will be in focus, because of their proven importance for future habits and changes of consumer behaviour.
The team will also carry out a systematic literature review on organic food and health, with an analysis of all reported indicators differentiating consumers of organic vs. conventional food.
All the project outcomes and networking actions aim to set a strong background for a multicentre Horizon Europe project about dietary transition, consumption of organic and sustainable food, health and wellbeing of inhabitants in ecoregions.
Website: http://www.insum.eu/
Coordination:
– Prof. Susanne Bügel, University of Copenhagen, Denmark shb@life.ku
– Prof. Carola Strassner, FH Münster University of Applied Sciences, Germany, strassner@fh-muenster.de
– Assoc. Prof. Dominika Srednicka-Tober, Warsaw University of Life Sciences, dominika_srednicka_tober@sggw.edu.pl
Global Alliance for Organic Districts (GAOD)
Goal: The main objectives are to share knowledge and practical examples and to invite other local governments of the world into the network. The transformation of global food and farming systems is also key towards achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and to this end, building effective partnerships and scaling up examples of practical solutions is highly important.
Description: We are supporters of the “Global Alliance for Organic Districts”! This network of networks from Asia, Europe and Regenerations International invites to the creation of this Alliance. On the 6th February 2020 the Memorandum of Understanding was signed at the Italian Ministry of Agriculture in Rome. This led to the creation of the Global Alliance for the Organic Districts. It is also planned to invite other local governments of the world (Africa, Americas, and countries in Oceania and the PICT (Pacific Islander Countries and Territories) into the cooperation network to form an example of a dynamic global organic food system.
The role of OFSP at this juncture is to facilitate and coordinate the process, share our views on food system transformation and food quality and health. Jostein Hertwig one of our OFSP coordinators became also a leading part of the GAOD coordination team. So, there will be closer cooperation on certain points. The Alliance activities started with the definition of the actions needed for the transformation to a truly sustainable future.
So far there have been five international GoTo meetings, with professional content from different participants and the further steps are becoming more concrete. Six working groups have been identified (see Website). They are open to contributions from all interested parties.
Website: https://gaod.online/ further information in our latest Newsletter page 3-4.
Contact details: coordination_team@gaod.online
Sustainable North Hesse, Germany – a regional food system approach
Goal: Key players from the food industry, local government and agriculture in North Hesse have joined together in an initiative entitled “Sustainable North Hesse” with the aim of establishing a regionally sustainable food system in North Hesse. The Sustainable North Hesse initiative consists of the regional authorities of North Hesse (a total of 6 counties representing 1 million inhabitants), the University of Kassel, various district farmers’ associations, various NGOs, Raiffeisen Waren GmbH, various agricultural businesses and other civil society and public institutions.
Description: The strategy of “Sustainable North Hesse” is pursuing the establishment of additional regional and standard-based value chains as transformative drivers for regenerative agriculture and a planetary sustainable diet in the region. This is to be achieved through the creation of a food policy council, initiating new governance mechanisms for a regional food policy. A status quo analysis of existing short supply chains within the region shall determine potential opportunities for additional value chains along with the necessary logistics. Here the Food Hub model from the Unites States may offer an exiting possibility to supplement existing structures. The establishment of new value creation as well as food aggregation and logistic capacities are much needed in the sector of public dining halls as well as the gastronomy of the region. Through a systemic approach, trying to utilize multiple leverage points at the same time the project is intending to contribute new narratives to the local food consumption in North Hesse, which is still hiding in its niche. Even though the project has a focus on organic there also is a great opportunity to include local foods from farms that are committed to good agricultural practice, with the aim to create incentives for conversion to organic. Inspired by the “Food for Life” program by the British Soil Association the project “Sustainable North Hesse” will also try to get into the school and pre-school food environment in order to help sharpen pupils’ awareness about the positive impacts of organic food systems and assist caterers to adopt seasonal menu planning for their school cafeterias.
Contact details: Sebastian Kretschmer, sk@uni-kassel.de
Website: https://www.nachhaltiges-nordhessen.de/
References:
Capra, F. (2015): THE SYSTEMS VIEW OF LIFE. A UNIFYING CONCEPTION OF MIND, MATTER, AND LIFE.
Gerten, D. et al. (2020): Feeding ten billion people is possible within four terrestrial planetary boundaries.
Morley, A.; Morgan, S.; Morgan, K. (2008): Food Hubs. The ‘Missing Middle’ of the Local Food Infrastructure?
Willett, Walter; Rockström, Johan; Loken, Brent; Springmann, Marco; Lang, Tim; Vermeulen, Sonja et al. (2019): Food in the Anthropocene: the EAT–Lancet Commission on healthy diets from sustainable food systems. In Lancet 393 (10170), pp. 447–492. DOI: 10.1016/S0140-6736(18)31788-4.
Organic Rice standard for rice production and processing in Indonesia
Goal: The aim is to describe the gap of organic principle and its application throughout production, processing and consumption. The consumption of organic rice is second most in Indonesia. For this reason rice is the focus in this research project.
Description: In this research, we elaborate the organic rice standard in Indonesia linked to the organic food system. The research endeavours to identify the current condition of organic rice standard in Indonesia and finding the gap to enhance the sustainable approach and to answer the question, “Is the organic rice standard suitable for supporting sustainable organic food system or not?” We conduct a three-year research starting from cultivation, processing and consumption of organic rice in Indonesia. We found that (1) cultivation of organic rice fits the sustainable approach in terms of less pesticide residue, better farmer incomes as well as protecting biodiversity (2) organic rice processing following the conventional milling standard has resulted in decreasing nutritional ingredient, however organic rice in the whole grain mode has high bioactive compound as well as low post harvest cost (3) consumer perception of organic rice is high due to the healthiness attribute, which cannot be easily proven, as long as the milling approach using conventional standard is adopted. From this study, we conclude that the gap of research in processing and consumption of organic rice should be the research priority, i.e. what is the standard of milling in organic rice? Or what is the perception of the consumer relating to organic brown rice in Indonesia? Based on these, we could suggest the minimize milling degree in the organic rice or in the mode of whole grain (brown rice). The challenges of organic whole grain rice (organic brown rice) acceptability is the consumer perception. Our further study about intervention of nutritional information on organic brown rice can be download here: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13165-019-00269-z. Parallel to this research, Indonesia Government launched the regulation for degree of milling of organic rice. The regulation stated that organic rice should be in the shape of whole grain (un-polished rice).
http://ditjenpp.kemenkumham.go.id/arsip/bn/2018/bn6-2018.pdf
Coordination: Universitas Bakrie, Indonesia, Wahyudi David, wahyudi.david@bakrie.ac.id
“Code of Practice for organic food processing – ProOrg” A Core Organic Cofund project
Goal: ProOrg project has the objective to develop a flexible and practicable Code of Practice (CoP) for processors of organic foods, as well as labelling organizations.
Description: The CoP will provide the operators with strategies and tools for making decisions that can help them to take the best choice for careful processing methods and formulations with a limited use of additives, while addressing the organic principles, high food quality, low environmental impact and high degree of consumer acceptance. The project builds on a participatory design and involves experts from different scientific disciplines, representatives of processors, traders, labelling organizations and other relevant stakeholders, as well as individual companies.
The development of the CoP will be based on an iterative process in which the CoP will be tested at industry and retail level by case studies and a market survey, supported with scientific experiments and analytical determinations, to define the final version. Studies will be performed to identify consumer preferences and acceptance of processing technologies of organic food. Communication strategies and tools will be developed to provide consumers with adequate information about processing technologies to be used in the organic sector. A dissemination plan completes the project.
Website:https://www.proorgproject.com/
Coordinator: Flavio Paoletti (e-mail: flavio.paoletti@crea.gov.it)
Partner countries: IT, DE, CH, NL, HU, FR, PL & DK
Goal: TEFSI supports a cooperation between 9 European universities from 8 EU countries to develop, implement and widely disseminate innovative teaching approaches, materials, methods and tools, thus increase university teachers’ competences and innovation, and in a consequence, improve the quality and effectiveness of university teaching.
Description: Usage of innovative teaching methods in TEFSI project is illustrated for the subjects covering various aspects of sustainable food systems, thus increase teachers’ awareness about the importance of including sustainability issues into their everyday lecturing, and therefore form an important step of food science, human nutrition, agriculture, and related life science education towards sustainability. The project began with an in-depth analysis of the level of inclusion of food system sustainability issues in higher education by European University lecturers, the lecturing tools being used & perspectives for innovation in this area, followed by the development of quality training materials on the innovative teaching tools & concepts, sharing them during 5 international staff training events, and finally disseminating during project Multiplier Events (conferences) and other dissemination activities. Transnationality of the project allows the biggest strengths of teaching approaches and strategies of participating Universities to be extracted, analysed & put together in the project activities and outputs.
Website: http://tefsi.tefsi-project.ogicom.pl/
Coordination: Warsaw University of Life Sciences, Dr. Dominika Średnicka-Tober dominika_srednicka_tober@sggw.pl
Promoting human health and well-being by maintaining matrix related organic food qualities from field to fork
Time: 1.03.2019-28.02.2021
Project partners: Warsaw University of Life Sciences (Coordinator), University of Kassel (Partner)
Goal: The aim of the project is to define and to promote food processing technologies that would assure bringing healthy attributes of the organic crops through the processing step.
Description: Demand for organic and biodynamic foods is strongly driven by consumers’ perception that they are more nutritious and health-beneficial. However, while vast majority of the research confirming superior qualities of organic foods is focused on raw materials, more and more food nowadays is highly processed. It is therefore a challenge to bring health related food properties from field to fork by employing more gentle processing methods. One of the organic principles (IFOAM) is the principle of processing with care, but until now details are missing on how food may be processed in such a gentle manner. The aim of our study is therefore to define and to promote food processing technologies that would assure bringing healthy attributes of the organic crops through the processing step. The study focuses on organic fruit preserves and juices processed according to a number of well-defined sets of conditions. Research studies show that the food matrix may not only play a major role in sensory perception of food but also may modulate its nutritional and health impact. Therefore the different food quality dimensions such as sensory and metabolic profiles, bioactive compounds concentrations, and health markers (in vitro anticancer and antioxidant potential, and metabolism of the exposed cells) have been included within this study.
Link to website: there is no dedicated project website, but here comes a link to the website of the Ekhaga foundation: http://www.ekhagastiftelsen.se/eng/
Contact details: Project coordinator: Dr Dominika Średnicka-Tober, Warsaw University of Life Sciences, e-mail: dominika_srednicka_tober@sggw.edu.pl; Tel. +48 22 5937035, +48 698 11 60 11.
BIO for Mother and Child, acronym BIO Mamma
Time: 1.09.2019-30.04.2021
Sponsors: Foundation Carrefour, Hipp Company, Piątnica Company
Project partner: Warsaw University of Life Sciences
Goal: The scientific aim of the project is to investigate the ecological and nutritional awareness and quality of life of young women from the Eastern Poland.
The educational goal is to raise the awareness of organic food in Poland among pregnant women and mothers of children under 6 years, also among the staff of educational institutions associated with this social group – nurseries, kindergartens, schools of birth. The parallel objective is to introduce selected organic products into the daily menu of the mentioned institutions. The practical goal is to stimulate the consumption of the organic food among the citizens of Eastern Poland.
Description: Within the project 36 workshops will be conducted from June 2020 to January 2021 for pregnant women, young mothers, staff of kindergartens, nurseries and schools of birth on organic food and its importance in the diet. In each of the following cities there will be 4 workshops (2 in kindergartens, one in nursery, one in a school of birth): – Lublin – Radom – Białystok – Olsztyn – Biała Podlaska – Siedlce – Wyszków – Warsaw.
The target group of the project are: • Pregnant and young children (up to 6 years) living in medium and large cities• Directors and employees of institutions with an impact on their diet • Local decision-makers (e.g. city mayors). About 1000 participants will take part in the workshops. In addition there is a small financial support for the interested kindergartens to convert partly into organic diet for children – at least 1 product should be organic (milk, carrot, potatoes, etc).
The project is expected to have a positive impact on nutritional habits of the women participating in the workshops. We hope to create ecological attitudes and awareness regardless of socio-economic situation and to increase a demand for organic food in the Eastern Poland.
Website: under constrution, will be ready in June 2020
Coordination: Prof. Ewa Rembiałkowska, Warsaw University of Life Sciences, e-mail: ewa_rembialkowska@sggw.pl; Tel. +48 22 5937038, +48 512 076 351.
Innovative Strategies for Public Catering: Sustainability Toolkit across Baltic Sea Region – StratKIT
Time: 01.01.2019 – 30.06.2021
Goal: The aim of the project is to develop a model of dynamic sustainable development for the countries of the Baltic Sea region, taking into account sustainable nutrition, as well as the environment and the economy of the food system.
Description: The public sector in the Baltic Sea region opt for circular economy and show a clear interest in Green Public Procurement when it comes to catering services. In principle, the sector looks for increasing its capacity to act as innovation driver and boost local and regional economy through the collaboration with SMEs. The StratKIT project analyses and tries to understand the local conditions and specific factors enabling or limiting the progress towards increasingly sustainable procurement and catering services. Public organizations and businesses differ. For this reason they need to construct their own developmental paths with their partners, either other public organizations, or commercial and social enterprises. The StratKIT project initiates the construction of these paths across the Baltic Sea region by mapping the current situation and creating the ground for networking and understanding the need for sustainable development. In addition, The results of the project’s activities are being fine tuned into a Baltic Sea region sustainability toolkit, which is an easy-to-follow and bottom-up guidance for sector’s professionals. The target is to harmonise processes towards sustainable procurement and catering services across Baltic Sea region, thus strengthening strategic efforts on the organizational and business sustainability path. Harmonizing progress towards sustainable procurement and catering services across BSR, thus strengthening strategic efforts on the organizational/business sustainability path. These achievements will bring BSR countries closer each other, have a positive impact on societal appreciation of public services and give a strong message in the market and among customers in BSR.
Website: https://projects.interreg-baltic.eu/projects/stratkit-197.html#information
Coordination: Res. Assoc. Renata Kazimierczak, Warsaw University of Life Sciences, E-mail: renata_kazimierczak@sggw.edu.pl; Tel. +48 22 5937035, +48 660 133 266.
COMPLETED PROJECTS:
Effect of Farming Systems on the Accumulation of Biologically Active and Anticancer Compounds of Potato Tubers with Coloured Flesh
Time: 1.02.2018-31.01.2020
Project partners: Vytautas Magnus University Agricultural Academy (Coordinator), Warsaw University of Life Sciences & Lithuanian University of Health Sciences (Partners)
Goal: The aim of the project was to examine the effects of farming systems (organic, biodynamic, conventional) on the soil properties and various quality characteristics of potato tubers with coloured flesh, including accumulation of biologically active compounds, minerals, sensory attributes and anticancer properties.
Description: Five potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) cultivars with different coloured flesh (Red Emmalie, Violetta, Salad Blue, Laura and Tornado were cultivated in conventional, organic and biodynamic farming systems at a farm in the Širvintos district of Lithuania in 2018 and 2019 season. Concentrations of phenolic compounds (total), flavonoids, anthocyanins and phenolic acids in potato tubers were evaluated. Potato tuber samples underwent also sensory evaluation with the Quantitative Descriptive Analysis (QDA®) method. Moreover, the effect of potato extracts on the human gastric adenocarcinoma (AGS) cells viability and proliferation was evaluated. The standard methods have been used to test energy metabolism in gastric adenocarcinoma cell cultures.
Website: there is no dedicated project website, but here comes a link to the website of the Ekhaga foundation: http://www.ekhagastiftelsen.se/eng/
References: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/7/2701
Contact details: Project coordinator: Prof. dr. Elvyra Jariene, Vytautas Magnus University Agricultural Academy (e-mail: elvyra.jariene@vdu.lt; Tel.: +370 37 752 226); Coordinator of the WULS tasks in the project: Dr Dominika Średnicka-Tober, Warsaw University of Life Sciences (e-mail: dominika_srednicka_tober@sggw.edu.pl; Tel. +48 22 5937035, +48 698 11 60 11).
