Food PolicyPub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-11-27DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102977
Trevor Woolley , Sharon Pailler , Jonathan McFadden , Zach Raff , Sharon Raszap Skorbiansky , Kevin Kuruc
{"title":"A scoping review of (dis-)incentives for animal welfare-improving farming practices","authors":"Trevor Woolley , Sharon Pailler , Jonathan McFadden , Zach Raff , Sharon Raszap Skorbiansky , Kevin Kuruc","doi":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102977","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102977","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Public interest in improving farm animal welfare has increased in recent years, but research on implementation of on-farm enhanced welfare practices lags behind. This review examines the incentives and barriers to adoption of animal welfare-improving farming practices from the perspective of key stakeholders: farmers and other animal product producers. We perform a machine-learning aided scoping review of the academic literature studying how different rearing practices influence economic outcomes for producers, providing direct evidence on the (dis-)incentives of adopting the practices studied. This allows us to (1) identify existing consensus and (2) highlight research gaps on the economic factors related to adoption of (or lack of) welfare-improved practices. Operating costs emerge as a near-universal disincentive for welfare-improving practices. Conversely, improved indoor environment shows potential benefits for animal health and productivity, suggesting the possibility of interventions that have only negligible impacts on overall profits. These takeaways are drawn from a relatively sparse literature, underscoring important research gaps. Addressing these gaps can inform evidence-based policies that align practice with public expectations for farm animal welfare while being cognizant of producer constraints and incentives.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":321,"journal":{"name":"Food Policy","volume":"137 ","pages":"Article 102977"},"PeriodicalIF":6.0,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145614296","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Food PolicyPub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-11-27DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.103008
Catherine Ragasa , David Spielman , John Lynam
{"title":"Agricultural innovation frames, policies, and instruments: evolution, lessons, and future research","authors":"Catherine Ragasa , David Spielman , John Lynam","doi":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.103008","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.103008","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Scientific and technical innovation offers solutions to many pressing development problems in low- and middle-income countries, particularly in the agriculture sector. However, successful innovation is almost always contingent on an enabling policy environment. This paper reviews the evolution of research on the interaction between agricultural innovation and public policy. It is organized around a sequence of three distinct conceptual frameworks and policy narratives that have shaped this body of research over the past 60 years: the science and technology policy frame, the innovation system policy frame, and the transformative innovation policy and scaling frame. Drawing on seminal studies—both conceptual and empirical—from each frame, we examine their aims and objectives, the policy issues they sought to address, and the methods of analysis used. We then identify and discuss five key agenda points for future research: (1) approaches that provide integrated frameworks, credible data, and novel methods to better assess multiple policy objectives and inform resource allocation in the context of multiple and competing development goals; (2) strategies that inform scaling efforts through a better understanding of how to develop best-fit approaches that take account of local context for scaling innovations for agronomy and natural resource management; (3) solutions-oriented research through action learning, co-design processes, and evaluations that quantify and qualify real-world impacts of the innovation process in a rigorous and nuanced manner; (4) entry points for organizational and institutional reforms to support innovation processes and scaling; and (5) entry points for supporting and accelerating sustainability transitions and systems-transformation. This agenda highlights the need to consider different technological, organizational, and institutional innovations at multiple scales as well as political and economic factors to better inform policy design and execution in a manner that achieves desired outcomes.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":321,"journal":{"name":"Food Policy","volume":"137 ","pages":"Article 103008"},"PeriodicalIF":6.0,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145614388","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Food PolicyPub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-08-06DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102936
Jennifer Clapp , William G. Moseley , Paola Termine , Barbara Burlingame
{"title":"Multi-scalar policy uptake of the six-dimensional food security framework","authors":"Jennifer Clapp , William G. Moseley , Paola Termine , Barbara Burlingame","doi":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102936","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102936","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>In 2022, along with colleagues, we proposed a six-dimensional food security framework in a <em>Food Policy</em> viewpoint article that argued for the need to expand the commonly cited four pillar approach (availability, access, utilization and stability) by adding two additional dimensions: agency and sustainability. The proposal was not just for a new conceptual framework for scholarly analysis, but also for its application in policy settings. Over three years later, we are humbled to see widespread uptake of our call to embrace agency and sustainability as dimensions of food security in multiple tyles of policy settings at different scales. This brief policy comment outlines the growing recognition and application of the six-dimensional framework for food security in policy contexts from the global to the local level. We are hopeful that the growing application of this idea will help to make improvements in the global quest to end hunger.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":321,"journal":{"name":"Food Policy","volume":"137 ","pages":"Article 102936"},"PeriodicalIF":6.0,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144781847","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Food PolicyPub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-11-17DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102995
Ruth Meinzen-Dick , Isabel Lambrecht , Frank Place , Uchendu Eugene Chigbu , Iliana Monterroso , Diana Suhardiman
{"title":"Expanding tenure horizons in food policy research","authors":"Ruth Meinzen-Dick , Isabel Lambrecht , Frank Place , Uchendu Eugene Chigbu , Iliana Monterroso , Diana Suhardiman","doi":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102995","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102995","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This paper reviews key trends in research, policy, and practice related to tenure over natural resources, especially land. Economic, anthropological, political, legal, and intrahousehold research have all contributed to broadening the understanding of tenure. Evidence shows that tenure security is associated with many development outcomes, especially with long-term investments that can improve productivity, sustainability, and enhance stewardship of resources, resilient livelihoods, and empowerment of rights holders. However, formalization and individualization reforms have not always led to intended benefits, showing the complexity of tenure and the importance of many contextual factors, including existing security offered by informal systems. Growing evidence on effective community management of commons contributed to devolution programs transferring responsibility and rights over forests, rangelands, irrigation and fisheries to user groups. Large-scale land acquisitions in the wake of the 2009 food price crisis created widespread tenure insecurity, especially for communities without documented land rights. The Voluntary Guidelines on the Governance of Tenure were designed to address these problems, but because they remain voluntary, threats of land expropriation remain. Equity of tenure and outcomes of reform programs have become increasingly prominent as civil society groups from peasant movements, Indigenous Peoples, ethnic minorities, women, and youth have taken up issues of land and resource rights. Further transdisciplinary research is needed to identify policy options and implementation processes that can secure land rights for the marginalized, while also considering rights to resources beyond land, especially as economies transition from rural and agrarian to periurban with diversified livelihoods.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":321,"journal":{"name":"Food Policy","volume":"137 ","pages":"Article 102995"},"PeriodicalIF":6.0,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145575854","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Food PolicyPub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-07-09DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102914
Bhagyashree Katare , Krystal L. Hodge
{"title":"Creating awareness and informing policy: Implications of Buzby and Hyman’s food loss estimates in the United States","authors":"Bhagyashree Katare , Krystal L. Hodge","doi":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102914","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102914","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":321,"journal":{"name":"Food Policy","volume":"137 ","pages":"Article 102914"},"PeriodicalIF":6.8,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144580046","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Food PolicyPub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-10-31DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102975
Juan Carlos Salgado , Bhairavi Jayaraman , Lindsey Smith Taillie , Shu Wen Ng
{"title":"Firm’s responses to food policies to reduce consumption of ultra-processed food and beverages: lessons from the existing evidence","authors":"Juan Carlos Salgado , Bhairavi Jayaraman , Lindsey Smith Taillie , Shu Wen Ng","doi":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102975","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102975","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Food policies seeking to lower the intake of ultra-processed foods and beverages (a risk factor for obesity and related cardiovascular diseases) are gaining traction. Producer behaviors toward these policies can affect whether policies achieve public health goals. In this narrative review, we synthesize available evidence from ex-ante and ex-post studies since 2015 to assess strategic responses by the food industry to a broad set of mandatory food policies on ultra-processed foods and beverages, including taxes, labeling, marketing restrictions, and claims. Based on 49 papers, we found strategic pricing as the most prevalent assessed producer response, followed by product reformulation, and changes in product portfolio (product entry or exit), marketing, and package size. Evidence to date points towards product reformulation and portfolio changes reinforcing the public health goal for food policies, as these producer responses improve the nutrient profile of available products, albeit unintended consequences can emerge via the use of non-sugar sweeteners. Strategic pricing can strengthen public health goals for food policies when unhealthy products become relatively more expensive than expected compared to healthier options. Otherwise, strategic pricing works against these goals. Mixed results arise from changes in marketing as their post-policy sales effectiveness can shrink, but producers can increase the marketing intensity of unhealthy foods. Evidence of package size changes is scarce and inconclusive. The overall implications of strategic producer responses will depend on market structure and share, their magnitude and scope (producers often respond in a mixture of ways), and how consumers adjust their demand in consequence. Policymakers and researchers should account for strategic producer responses in the policy design and evaluation process.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":321,"journal":{"name":"Food Policy","volume":"137 ","pages":"Article 102975"},"PeriodicalIF":6.0,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145412434","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Food PolicyPub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-06-24DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102909
Nathaniel Jensen , Christopher Barrett , Andrew Mude , Rupsha Banerjee , Yuma Noritomo , Kelvin Shikuku , Kazushi Takahashi , Nils Teufel
{"title":"Index-based Livestock insurance to support pastoralists against droughts","authors":"Nathaniel Jensen , Christopher Barrett , Andrew Mude , Rupsha Banerjee , Yuma Noritomo , Kelvin Shikuku , Kazushi Takahashi , Nils Teufel","doi":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102909","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102909","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Policy Comments do not include an abstract. (https://www.sciencedirect.com/special-issue/311580/call-for-policy-comments-for-food-policy).</div></div>","PeriodicalId":321,"journal":{"name":"Food Policy","volume":"137 ","pages":"Article 102909"},"PeriodicalIF":6.8,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144481489","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Food PolicyPub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-10-28DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102981
Hannah Ameye , Vivien Hülsen , Katrin Glatzel , Amos Laar , Matin Qaim
{"title":"Urbanizing food environments in Africa: Challenges and opportunities for improving accessibility, affordability, convenience, and desirability of healthy diets","authors":"Hannah Ameye , Vivien Hülsen , Katrin Glatzel , Amos Laar , Matin Qaim","doi":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102981","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102981","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Food environments are changing in a rapidly urbanizing Africa. These changes have important dietary consequences in a region already contending with the triple burden of malnutrition. In this article, we first discuss the challenges associated with defining and measuring food environments in low- and middle-income countries and present recent progress in developing context-appropriate indicators and tools. Further, using mixed methods scoping reviews, we examine how urbanizing food environments affect diets and nutrition in Africa, differentiating between various food environment domains, namely food accessibility, affordability, convenience, and desirability. The findings suggest that urbanization improves stable access to more diverse and nutritious foods. At the same time, urbanizing food environments make ultra-processed foods and other convenient but unhealthy food choices more accessible, affordable, and desirable, contributing to overweight, obesity, and chronic disease risk. We discuss several policy options to improve the healthfulness of food environments, including industry and retail regulation, product labeling, taxes and subsidies, and school feeding programs, among others. National and local policy approaches need to be context-specific and considered within the wider political economy of food environments. We also mention further research needs in terms of measuring food environments and evaluating the effects of policy interventions.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":321,"journal":{"name":"Food Policy","volume":"137 ","pages":"Article 102981"},"PeriodicalIF":6.0,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145412432","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Food PolicyPub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-11-19DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102996
Lauren Chenarides , Andrew S. Hanks , Jake Berard , Andrea C. Carlson , George Davis , Amelia B. Finaret
{"title":"A review of data linkages for policy-informing research in food and agricultural economics","authors":"Lauren Chenarides , Andrew S. Hanks , Jake Berard , Andrea C. Carlson , George Davis , Amelia B. Finaret","doi":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102996","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.102996","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Researchers commonly use linked data as an empirical tool because information relevant to answer policy questions is often dispersed across multiple sources. To understand how linked data are used in food and agricultural economics research, we conducted a systematic review of 104 peer-reviewed articles, published between 2000 and 2020, in which authors combine data sources to conduct their intended analyses. With our sample of papers, we classify types of data used, describe linkage methods, and summarize empirical approaches. Results show that most studies use public data, and many apply causal methods to examine food policy questions. These patterns highlight the value of public data and the role of linked datasets in food and agricultural economics research. Continued investment in data access, infrastructure, and shared practices for managing and analyzing integrated datasets can strengthen and expand the use of linked data in future research.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":321,"journal":{"name":"Food Policy","volume":"137 ","pages":"Article 102996"},"PeriodicalIF":6.0,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145575855","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Food PolicyPub Date : 2025-11-01Epub Date: 2025-11-20DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.103006
Vincenzina Caputo , Jiayu Sun , Ellen J. Van Loo
{"title":"Evaluating policy and industry-based interventions for healthier online food-away-from-home choices: A scoping review","authors":"Vincenzina Caputo , Jiayu Sun , Ellen J. Van Loo","doi":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.103006","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.foodpol.2025.103006","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The rapid digital transformation of the food-away-from-home (FAFH) sector has redefined how consumers access and select meals. Digital delivery platforms such as Uber Eats, Deliveroo, and Meituan have become influential market intermediaries, shaping the nutritional landscape of food environments and raising concerns about their healthfulness. This study reviews empirical evidence on policy-based and industry-led interventions aimed at improving dietary outcomes in digital FAFH environments. Following PRISMA guidelines and using machine-learning–assisted screening (ASReview), 37 peer-reviewed studies were identified across four domains: nutritional labeling, fiscal measures, food-assistance programs, and digital nudges or decision-support tools. Findings indicate that although traditional food-policy instruments designed for physical food environments can be adapted to digital contexts, their effects remain modest and context specific. Industry-led interventions, such as menu reordering, healthier defaults, and real-time basket feedback, show encouraging effects on meal quality and calorie reduction when integrated into online platform design. Opportunities also exist to embed digital policies and personalized decision aids within platform interfaces, providing scalable mechanisms for nutrition governance. Yet regulatory ambiguity, limited transparency, and profit-oriented design incentives constrain their reach. Cross-country disparities in market structure, investment, and institutional capacity further restrict policy diffusion, with most evidence drawn from high-income economies. The review calls for governance frameworks that treat digital food-delivery platforms not as passive outlets but as active infrastructures for public-health policy.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":321,"journal":{"name":"Food Policy","volume":"137 ","pages":"Article 103006"},"PeriodicalIF":6.0,"publicationDate":"2025-11-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145575856","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}