Aims and scope

Aims and Scope

Food Security is a wide audience, interdisciplinary, international journal dedicated to the procurement, access (economic and physical), and quality of food, in all its dimensions. Scales range from the individual to communities, and to the world food system. We strive to publish high-quality scientific articles, where quality includes, but is not limited to, the quality and clarity of text, and the validity of methods and approaches.

Food Security is the initiative of a distinguished international group of scientists from different disciplines who hold a deep concern for the challenge of global food security, together with a vision of the power of shared knowledge as a means of meeting that challenge. To address the challenge of global food security, the journal seeks to address the constraints - physical, biological and socio-economic - which not only limit food production but also the ability of people to access a healthy diet.

Food Security publishes a diversity of refereed research papers, together with review articles, case studies and letters to the editor. The journal covers the principles and practice of food security per se, taking an overview of the subject or analysing it with a broad perspective over its many component disciplines. All the dimensions of food security are covered by the Journal, from production, to stability, to access (physical and economic), stocks, markets and trade (local to global), as well as the nutritional value of food. We particularly value submissions that take a synthetic view of the science, sociology and economics of food production, agricultural development, access to food, and nutrition.

Food Security does not seek to duplicate the coverage of the many publications that focus specifically on those component disciplines.

From this perspective, the journal covers the following areas:

• Global food needs: the mismatch between population and the ability to provide adequate nutrition
• Global food potential and global food production
• Natural constraints to satisfying global food needs:
  § Climate, climate variability, and climate change
  § Desertification and flooding
  § Natural disasters
  § Soils, soil quality and threats to soils, edaphic and other abiotic constraints to production
  § Biotic constraints to production, pathogens, pests, and weeds in their effects on sustainable production
• The sociological contexts of food production, access, quality, and consumption.
• Nutrition, food quality and food safety.
• Socio-political factors that impinge on the ability to satisfy global food needs:
  § Land, agricultural and food policy
  § International relations and trade
  § Access to food
  § Financial policy
  § Wars and ethnic unrest
• Research policies and priorities to ensure food security in its various dimensions.