A System Dynamics Approach towards Food Security in Agrifood Supply Networks: A Critical Taxonomy of Modern Challenges in a Sustainability Context

As defined by the Food and Agriculture Organization, food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food to meet their needs. Nevertheless, external forces as, indicatively, climate change, global population increase, rise of alternative energy sources, agricultural technological advances, and consumer dietary preferences changes shape the global contemporary food management landscape by disputing the aforementioned definition. Furthermore, the recent food security crisis of 2007-2008 brought food insecurity to the forefront of the global sustainable development agenda highlighting the need to reconsider the structure and operations of international agrifood supply networks (AFSN), and streamline the relevant policy-making. In this manuscript, we provide a two-fold critical taxonomy of the food security challenges and future uncertainties. More specifically, we identify the major challenges that render food security with great volatility and we provide a taxonomy of existing research efforts, according to the four food security basic dimensions, i.e. availability, stability, accessibility, and utilization, as these are mapped on the relevant sustainability aspects (environmental, economic, societal, and governmental) of an AFSN. Our critical analysis demonstrates that food security and sustainable AFSNs have attracted the global research interest, focusing more on addressing case-dependent AFSN problems, and less on developing integrated methodological approaches for the optimization of the entire supply chain. Our analysis further incorporates a System Dynamics approach that captures the dynamic nature of the interrelations of food security aspects in a sustainability context and further allows the assessment of different policy interventions. This work is the first step towards the development of a quantitative strategic decisionmaking support tool that could be employed by policy-makers, in both the private and public sectors, including governments, international organizations, and food industry enterprises towards the effective design and efficient operation of AFSNs in a sustainable manner.