Assessing Agri-Food Start-Ups Sustainability in Peri-Urban Agriculture Context

Ambrogio Zanzi, Valentina Vaglia, Roberto Spigarolo and Stefano Bocchi
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Ambrogio Zanzi: Department of Environmental Science and Policy, Università degli Studi di Milano, 20133 Milan, Italy
Valentina Vaglia: Department of Environmental Science and Policy, Università degli Studi di Milano, 20133 Milan, Italy
Roberto Spigarolo: Department of Environmental Science and Policy, Università degli Studi di Milano, 20133 Milan, Italy
Stefano Bocchi: Department of Environmental Science and Policy, Università degli Studi di Milano, 20133 Milan, Italy

Land, 2021, vol. 10, issue 4, 1-20

Abstract: Latest international directives indicate the need for sustainable development, linking socio-economic and environmental aspects, to reach the goals set by Agenda 2030. In this context, peri-urban agriculture can represent the opportunity to increase cities’ sustainability, improving their liveability level, fulfilling a crucial social part since it assures new sources of job opportunities and territorial requalification. This study presents a peri-urban requalification experience, conducted in Milan, Italy, where, within the European funded project OpenAgri, eight agri-food start-ups began their activities in a peri-urban area at the southern gates of the city. The study aims to assess and evaluate these start-ups’ sustainability using the Sustainability Assessment of Food and Agriculture systems (SAFA), which considers four sustainability pillars: Good governance, economic resilience, environmental integrity and social well-being. The application of SAFA indicators to the eight start-ups revealed their positive aspects and some limitations, typical of some not structured enterprises. The research describes a scalable and replicable example of peri-urban agriculture’s potentiality in solving environmental, social and economic issues and tests FAO’s SAFA framework, which is still unexplored in this sustainability assessment context.

Keywords: sustainability evaluation; peri-urban agriculture; SAFA tool; entrepreneurship (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q15 Q2 Q24 Q28 Q5 R14 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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