Cogent Food & Agriculture

Food Processing Resilience for Food Security and Sustainability: Safety, Quality, Circularity and Scalable Innovation

Food security and sustainability increasingly depend not only on primary production but also on the capacity of food processing systems to convert perishable raw materials into safe, nutritious, stable, and accessible foods under changing environmental and supply conditions. Processing resilience refers to the ability of food manufacturing and preservation systems to maintain safety, quality, functionality, and production continuity while adapting to resource constraints, climate-related pressures, disruptions in energy or raw materials, and evolving consumer needs. This Article Collection will bring together food science, technology, and engineering research that strengthens the contribution of processing, preservation, fermentation, packaging, monitoring, and resource-efficient production to resilient and sustainable food systems.

This topic is important because food security can be weakened by losses and quality deterioration after harvest, microbial and chemical hazards, short shelf life, resource-intensive processing, and interruptions in production or logistics. Technologies that preserve nutritional and sensory quality while reducing food loss, water and energy demand, waste generation, and environmental impacts can improve the availability, utilization, and stability of food supplies. Linking food safety and quality with circular resource use, by-product valorization, life cycle performance, and processing continuity can therefore connect food technology more directly with sustainability outcomes. A complementary implementation dimension will consider techno-economic feasibility, investment and organizational constraints, and the conditions required for promising food-processing innovations to be adopted and sustained at scale.

The Article Collection welcomes original research and review articles on advanced thermal and nonthermal processing, fermentation and beneficial microorganisms, food safety and quality management, mycotoxins and other contaminants, preservation and shelf life, sustainable and intelligent packaging, smart sensing and data-driven process control, recovery of bioactive compounds, food waste and by-product valorization, water and energy efficiency, life cycle assessment, and processing responses to climate, supply, or resource shocks. (Contributions linking processing innovations to food loss reduction, nutritional quality, food security, circular food systems, and environmental sustainability are particularly encouraged.) Studies on scale-up, techno-economic assessment, investment requirements, organizational resilience, and technology adoption are also welcome when they remain clearly anchored in food science and technology and demonstrate relevance to resilient, secure, and sustainable food systems.

Keywords: Food security and sustainability, Food processing resilience, Food safety and quality, Sustainable processing technologies, Circular food systems

Guest Advisors:

Prof. Theodoros Varzakas, Ph.D., is a professor in the Department of Food Science and Technology at the University of the Peloponnese, Greece. His research spans food technology and engineering, food safety and quality, fermentation, mycotoxins, extra virgin olive oil, preservation, and sustainable food systems. He serves as Section Editor-in-Chief for Food Security and Sustainability in Foods. His expertise provides the principal scientific foundation for this Article Collection, linking resilient food processing, safety, quality, circularity, and resource-efficient technologies with food security and sustainability outcomes. Here is the link to his ORCID page: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3927-9056

Prof. Musa Gün, Ph.D., is a finance scholar at Recep Tayyip Erdoğan University, Türkiye, with research interests in financial economics, sustainability, agricultural and food sector finance, forecasting, and data-driven decision methods. His recent research has examined financial knowledge, managerial competence, and liquidity constraints in the Turkish tea processing industry in relation to processing continuity and food security. Within this Article Collection, his complementary expertise focuses on techno-economic feasibility, investment and resource constraints, and the scalable adoption of processing innovations that can support resilient and sustainable food systems. Here is the link to his ORCID page: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5020-9342

Disclosure statement: Both guest advisors declare no conflict of interest.

All manuscripts submitted to this Article Collection will undergo desk assessment and peer-review as part of our standard editorial process; the Guest Advisor for this Collection will not be handling the manuscripts (unless they are an Editorial Board member).

Please review the journal scope  and author submission instructions  prior to submitting a manuscript.

The deadline for submitting manuscripts is August 31st, 2027.

Please contact Ruby Ru at ruby.ru@taylorandfrancis.com  with any queries and discount codes regarding this Article Collection.

To submit your papers to this Article Collection, please:

1. Check "yes" for the question, "Are you submitting your paper for a specific special issue or article collection?"
2. Select the relevant Article Collection from the drop-down menu under the question, "Special Issue or Article Collection Name."