How Blockchain Facilitates the Transition toward Circular Economy in the Food Chain?

Food loss and waste are two of the many problems that modern society is facing. To date, among many solutions, the circular economy is the one prevailing. A successful transition toward a circular economy (CE) requires the food sector to overcome the challenges of today's complex food supply chains such as information asymmetry, poor cooperation among stakeholders, and concerns about food safety. Blockchain, a form of distributed ledger technology, has been progressively gaining traction in supply chains in areas like data management, certifying product provenance and tracking products. Despite its importance, knowledge around the potential of the blockchain technology in facilitating the transition towards a circular economy in the agri-food sector is fragmented. This review provides evidence-based insights into the blockchain implementations in the food supply chains and the implications for CE. Our findings indicated four major areas that blockchain could accelerate CE in the agri-food sector: improving data utility; supply chain management efficacy; enhanced eco-efficiency; and superior traceability

The intersection of blockchain technology and circular economy in the agri-food sector

The following are the supplementary data related to this article: Table A1. Main drivers and examples of food loss and waste across food supply chains (not exhaustive). Available online at: https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S2352550922002986-mmc1.docx (Word document (33KB)); Table B1. A List of the reviewed literature and a summary of the findings (in total 44 articles were collected of which 39 were retrieved from databases and five articles were added manually after checking the references within the reviewed articles). Available online at: https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S2352550922002986-mmc2.docx (Word document (59KB)); Table C1. Evidence of employing blockchain-based use cases on the ‘Circular Economy’ within the agri-food domain. Available online at: https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S2352550922002986-mmc3.docx (Word document (47KB)).Copyright © 2022 The Authors / Institution of Chemical Engineers. A transition towards a circular economy within the agri-food sector requires the improvement of efficiency in resource utilization, the prevention of food loss or waste, whilst adopting regenerative agricultural practices. In addition to the technical challenges, the agri-food industry needs to address the food safety concerns resulting from biomass recycling processes. Increasingly, blockchain technology is gaining traction, moving towards more sustainable and precision agriculture. The blockchain is a decentralized, immutable, and shared database that records the provenance of digital assets, making it a suitable platform for traceability and food supply chain management. Despite its growing importance, the existing literature regarding these themes and the empirical evidence of blockchain-based solutions for a circular economy is rather fragmented. This paper offers a scoping review regarding the role of blockchain technology in the transition towards a circular food system. A total of 44 papers published in peer-reviewed journals were reviewed to identify new scientific insights into the application of blockchains within the agricultural sector. The results indicate that blockchain technology has a great potential in reducing food loss through optimized eco-efficiency (e.g., digitalization and integration with the Internet of Things) and by alleviating asymmetric information (by increasing transparency and reducing dependence on intermediaries). However, in the case of recycling efficiency, despite its potential, there remains a paucity of evidence regarding the use of blockchain technology in improving the residual valorization processes. Furthermore, there is a stream of literature focusing on the ability of blockchain-enabled traceability (e.g., for organic production or supply chain management). Yet, the role of blockchain traceability in the monitoring of risks from recycled biomass and the reporting of the sustainability performance in the supply chain has received scant attention within research literature. These results provide insights for supply chain management operations with the view of shifting towards a circular economy whilst also suggesting an agenda for future research areas.This work was supported by the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Sweden, by a scholarship from L Nannesson’s foundation, grant number Dnr SLU.ua.2019.3.1.5-617

Factors Affecting Consumers' Dairy Products Preferences

Choice models represent a valid approach for the analysis of consumers’ preferences as these models offer an opportunity to investigate many aspects that influence consumer behaviour. This study with the purpose of investigating consumers’ preferences and their affecting factors were conducted by using the nested logit model in Sari, Iran in 2018. The results revealed that yoghurt, milk and cheese had the most preferences among the dairy products and consumers had more tendencies towards using low fat than full-fat dairy products. The results of factors affecting dairy products choice indicated that price and family cost decreased the probability of products being chosen, and age, education and attention to exercise variables increased this probability. Marketing mixed variables (4p) also had a significant effect on the choice of dairy products

Mesenteric Responsiveness To Angiotensin I, II And Captopril During Renovascular Hypertension Induction

Essential hypertension is one of the risk factors of cardiovascular diseases. Hypertension etiology is not completely known, it seems that rennin-Angiotensin system has an important role in its etiology, Thus better recognition of this system and its activity changes or vascular reaction changes to different parts of this system during progressive hypertension can be more effective in better recognition of the disease progress and treatment."nMaterials and Methods: In this study responsiveness of mesenteric vessels of Goldblatt two kidney- one clip (2k-lc) renovascular hypertensive rats to angiotensin / and II with and with out captopril during a time of two , four , six and eight weeks after hypertension induction was investigated and compared with control and surgical sham groups."nResults: This study shows that vascular responsiveness to angiotensin // in animals that passed four weeks of their hypertension , (p< 0.05) and in the sixth and eight week of post induction hypertension (p< 0.01 and p< 0.001) has a significant different with both sham and control groups. Also it has been observed that an increased reaction to angiotensin II with an increased significant rate of arterial hypertension in hypertensive group. In the other hand in spite of inhibition of angiotensin converting enzyme by captopril in animals that have been eight weeks hypertension , on the contrary to other groups reactive to angiotensin /."nConclusion: Results of this study show that vessels reaction to angiotensin /and II increased due to six to eight weeks post induction renal hypertension. Captopril does not inhibite mesenteric vessels reaction to Angiotensin / in hypertensive Rats after eight weeks. Try to completely inhibit production of angiotensin II maybe a hopful way in controlling essential hypertension