Overconsumption describes a situation where the use of a natural resource has exceeded the sustainable capacity of a system. A prolonged pattern of overconsumption leads to the eventual loss of resource bases. The term overconsumption is quite controversial in use, and does not necessarily have a single unifying definition. Overconsumption is driven by a number of factors of the current global economy, including forces like consumerism, planned obsolescence and other unsustainable business models and can be contrasted with sustainable consumption.
Sustainable agriculture is farming in sustainable ways meeting society's present food and textile needs, without compromising the ability for current or future generations to meet their needs. It can be based on an understanding of ecosystem services. There are many methods to increase the sustainability of agriculture. When developing agriculture within sustainable food systems, it is important to develop flexible business process and farming practices.
Fishery is the enterprise of raising or harvesting fish and other aquatic life. Commercial fisheries include wild fisheries and fish farms, both in fresh water and the oceans. About 500 million people worldwide are economically dependent on fisheries. 171 million tonnes of fish were produced in 2016, but overfishing is an increasing problem -- causing declines in some populations. Recreational fishing is popular in many locations, particularly North America, Europe, New Zealand, and Australia.
Urban agriculture,urban farming, or urban gardening is the practice of cultivating, processing, and distributing food in or around urban areas. Urban agriculture is also the term used for animal husbandry, aquaculture, urban beekeeping, and horticulture. These activities occur in peri-urban areas as well. Peri-urban agriculture may have different characteristics.
A plant-based diet or a plant-rich diet is a diet consisting mostly or entirely of plant-based foods. Plant-based foods are foods derived from plants with no animal-source foods or artificial ingredients. While a plant-based diet avoids or has limited animal products, it is not necessarily vegan. The Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics states that well-planned plant-based diets support health and are appropriate throughout all life stages, including pregnancy, lactation, childhood, and adulthood, as well as for athletes.
A prosumer is an individual who both consumes and produces. The term is a portmanteau of the words producer and consumer. Research has identified six types of prosumers: DIY prosumers, self-service prosumers, customizing prosumers, collaborative prosumers, monetised prosumers, and economic prosumers.
Food engineering is a scientific, academic, and professional field that interprets and applies principles of engineering, science, and mathematics to food manufacturing and operations, including the processing, production, handling, storage, conservation, control, packaging and distribution of food products. Given its reliance on food science and broader engineering disciplines such as electrical, mechanical, civil, chemical, industrial and agricultural engineering, food engineering is considered a multidisciplinary and narrow field. Due to the complex nature of food materials, food engineering also combines the study of more specific chemical and physical concepts such as biochemistry, microbiology, food chemistry, thermodynamics, transport phenomena, rheology, and heat transfer. Food engineers apply this knowledge to the cost-effective design, production, and commercialization of sustainable, safe, nutritious, healthy, appealing, affordable and high-quality ingredients and foods, as well as to the development of food systems, machinery, and instrumentation.
Business incubator is an organization that helps startup companies and individual entrepreneurs to develop their businesses by providing fullscale range of services starting with management training and office space and ending with venture capital financing. The National Business Incubation Association (NBIA) defines business incubators as a catalyst tool for either regional or national economic development. NBIA categorizes their members' incubators by the following five incubator types: academic institutions; non-profit development corporations; for-profit property development ventures; venture capital firms, and combination of the above.
The food industry is a complex, global network of diverse businesses that supplies most of the food consumed by the world's population. The term food industries covers a series of industrial activities directed at the production, distribution, processing, conversion, preparation, preservation, transport, certification and packaging of foodstuffs. The food industry today has become highly diversified, with manufacturing ranging from small, traditional, family-run activities that are highly labor-intensive, to large, capital-intensive and highly mechanized industrial processes. Many food industries depend almost entirely on local agriculture, produce, or fishing.
Water resource management is the activity of planning, developing, distributing and managing the optimum use of water resources. It is an aspect of water cycle management.
A shared-use kitchen is a licensed commercial space that is certified for food production. Renters or members can use the kitchen by the hour or day to produce food while fulfilling regulatory compliance. Food entrepreneurs, ranging from chefs, caterers, food trucks proprietors, bakers, to value-added producers, can benefit from the shared kitchen instead of spending capital to build or lease their own facility. A commissary kitchen is an example of a shared-use kitchen that provides kitchen rentals. Kitchen incubators, also known as culinary incubators, also provide kitchen rental but provide additional services like business development training, and access to ecosystem services such as legal aid, packaging, label printing, and distribution.
A sustainable food system is a type of food system that provides healthy food to people and creates sustainable environmental, economic and social systems that surround food.
Product-service systems (PSS) are business models that provide for cohesive delivery of products and services. PSS models are emerging as a means to enable collaborative consumption of both products and services, with the aim of pro-environmental outcomes.
Sustainability is the capacity to maintain in a ongoing way across various domains of life. In the 21st century, it refers generally to the capacity for Earth's biosphere and human civilization to co-exist. It is also defined as the process of people maintaining change in a homeostasis-balanced environment, in that the use of nature resources, the direction of investments, the orientation of technological development, and institutional change are all in harmony and enhance both current and future potential to meet human needs and aspirations. For many in the field, sustainability is defined through the following interconnected domains or pillars: environmental, economic and social, which according to Fritjof Capra, is based on the principles of systems thinking. Sub-domains of sustainable development have been considered also: cultural, technological and political. According to Our Common Future, sustainable development is defined as development that "meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs." Sustainable development may be the organizing principle of sustainability, yet others may view the two terms as paradoxical.
The term food system is used frequently in discussions about nutrition, food, health, community, economic development and agriculture. A food system includes all processes and infrastructure involved in feeding a population: growing, harvesting, processing, packaging, transporting, marketing, consumption, distribution and disposal of food and food-related items. It also includes the inputs needed and outputs generated at each of these steps. A food system operates within and is influenced by social, political, economic, and environmental contexts. It also requires human resources that provide labor, research and education. Food systems are either conventional or alternative according to their model of food lifespan from origin to plate.
The history of sustainability traces human-dominated ecological systems from the earliest civilizations to the present. This history is characterized by the increased regional success of a particular society, followed by crises that were either resolved, producing sustainability, or not, leading to decline.
Micro-sustainability is the portion of sustainability centered around small scale environmental measures that ultimately affect the environment through a larger cumulative impact. Micro-sustainability centers on individual efforts, behavior modification, education and creating attitudinal changes, which result in an environmentally conscious individual. Micro-sustainability encourages sustainable changes through "change agents", which are individuals that are encouraged to foster positive environmental action locally and inside their sphere of influence. Examples of micro-sustainability include recycling, power saving by turning off unused lights, programming thermostats for efficient use of energy, reducing water usage, changing commuting habits to use less fossil fuels or modifying buying habits to reduce consumption and waste. The emphasis of micro-sustainability is on an individual's actions, rather than organizational or institutional practices. These small local level actions have immediate community benefits if undertaken on a widespread scale and if imitated, they have a cumulative broad impact.
In capitalism, the sharing economy is a socio-economic system built around the sharing of resources. It often involves a way of purchasing goods and services that differs from the traditional business model of companies hiring employees to produce products to sell to consumers. It includes the shared creation, production, distribution, trade and consumption of goods and services by different people and organisations. These systems take a variety of forms, often leveraging information technology to empower individuals, corporations, non-profits and government with information that enables distribution, sharing and reuse of excess capacity in goods and services.
Bo01 is a neighborhood in the southern city of Malmö, Sweden known for its sustainable development and design. Bo01 began as part of the European Housing Exposition in 2001 and served as a prototype to help later design Västra hamnen. Today, Bo01 is known for its holistic approach to incorporate sustainable design into high-quality living and serves as one of the first Swedish models for sustainable urban planning.
Founding Farmers is an American upscale-casual restaurant owned by North Dakota Farmers Union and Farmers Restaurant Group. The restaurant was founded in 2008 when Farmers Restaurant Group owners Dan Simons and Michael Vucurevich partnered up with North Dakota Farmers Union to open Founding Farmers on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C. Founding Farmers is the first Leed Gold Designed restaurant in Washington, D.C. The restaurant is headquartered in Kensington, MD and has locations in DC, Maryland, Virginia, and Pennsylvania. Founding Farmers also has two sister restaurants, Farmers Fishers Bakers and Farmers & Distillers, both located in Washington, D.C.
