AGRIEU in Brief…
AGRIEU- “EU Sustainable Agri-Food Production Principles and Supply Chain Management: Innovative Approaches for Turkey’s Integration” project is a Jean Monnet Module project supported under the Erasmus+ Programme. It adopts to examine the innovations in the field of food and agriculture on the basis of European Union practices and within the framework of harmonization principles, including supply chain management information, and to raise awareness on this issue at the same time.
Importance of Agriculture and Food
Food has a vital role in human life. The global food system includes many regional, national and local food systems. There are as many as 1.3 billion people whose lives depend on food and agricultural livelihoods. Today, the agri-food industry is in a strategic position in the “food system”, which is an important environment. Therefore, the increasing food demand due to the increasing world population makes it necessary to change the forms of agricultural food production and consumption.
As associated with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, progress in agriculture-food production also affects developments in various fields such as environmental protection, circular economy, supply chain and waste management, which are important areas among EU policies. While sustainable food production and supply chain management in EU countries involve more comprehensive and efficient studies, Turkey and other non-EU countries can progress more slowly depending on the level of awareness and technological opportunities.
Due to the problems experienced in agricultural food production and supply chain management, the youth unemployment rate has increased, and the employment level of the female population, which is one of the labor policies to be considered, has not been reached. For this reason, it is necessary to create interaction, awareness and harmony in the agriculture-food sector and education life. Therefore, considering the current situation in the EU, it is necessary to map Turkey’s level of sustainability for agri-food production and add empirical research that will affect Turkey’s agri-food production strategies with the EU.
Main Purpose of the Project
In the light of all this information and up-to-date due diligence, the AGRIEU module project aimed to interpret the EU 2050 sustainability vision, “Living well, within the limits of our planet” (7th Environment Action Programme, EAP).
The main aim is to create a course titled “Sustainable Agri-Food Production and Supply Chain Management” to raise awareness of the participants about the concept of sustainability in agri-food production and supply chain management, and to develop a new course material that will be open to the general public. The second aim is to create a network of researchers between the public, students and professionals between Europe and Turkey to promote and research the European agri-food industry and EU food policies in a comprehensive manner.
For this reason, the academic gap will be filled by first designing the course curriculum and disseminating the outputs through Yaşar University’s online education opportunities to open course materials to those who have no chance to attend the courses.
The Developing World of Agriculture and Food
Food has been the main resource used to meet vital needs since the beginning of human history. There are many points that the food industry touches in daily life. Meeting the basic food needs with the increasing world population indicates that an expansion should be made in terms of capacity as well as keeping up with technology. At this point, food that can meet both quantitative and qualitative qualifications such as food security and food safety, and food that can be accessed by the consumer comes to the fore.
Considering that food cannot be considered independently of agriculture, it is an efficient agricultural process that is essential for an efficient food cycle. For this reason, agricultural production areas are also a role stakeholder in meeting the needs of the increasing world population. Increasing soil fertility and an efficient acceleration in plant and animal production are the basic needs.
On the one hand, population growth and on the other hand, rapidly changing environmental conditions have brought changes in the living and production standards of producers and consumers. For example, the concept of Industry 4.0 is a concept that should be kept up with gradually, especially by consumers, until the near future, while it is a process that should be carried out by manufacturers at least in parallel with the changes by developing competitor strategies. For this reason, it will be possible to manage the current agricultural-food products production efficiently with the use of technology in the coming years. In fact, products in varieties and quantities suitable for consumer needs will be possible in a sustainable cycle, independent of location, depending on changing climatic conditions, provided that they are suitable for producer conditions.
Studies in the field of food and agriculture are being handled from different perspectives day by day. In addition to production, the studies should also serve the purposes of effective use of resources and protection of the environment. For this reason, a production-consumption world will continue to be constructed on the basis of sustainable food, green production and circular economy concepts.
The AGRIEU project started on 1 February 2022 and will continue until 31 January 2025.
For more information, you can access https://agrieu.yasar.edu.tr/ or https://euc.yasar.edu.tr/ web pages.
• This project is funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.