Access to healthy food and the introduction of sustainable nutrition practices are two important issues today. The COVID-19 pandemic has brought new challenges to food security but it has also provided opportunities for local food production. The discussion on local food has been gaining attention in recent years, but there is still a lack of clear understanding of the term ‘local food’ in the literature. The relationship between local food and sustainability issues is still unclear and has various connotations. This discordance leads to further discussions on whether buying local food should be considered a sustainable behavior and whether consumer preference for local food can be perceived as a sustainable practice. A scoping literature review was conducted in order to fill this gap and to shed light on the main tendencies of the scientific literature regarding this topic. The outcomes of the research revealed three dimensions of ‘local food’ definitions in the literature: geographical, geopolitical, and organic; while the problem of a unified local food definition remains open. The studied literature did not show any sound evidence for sustainability attributes in the definition of local food and consumer perception of local food.

The nature of entrepreneurship and its developmental paths in the urban environment are extensively studied in the scientific literature. With a rising interest of scholars in the smart city phenomenon, the role entrepreneurship plays in the development of smart cities became a central topic in academia. However, there is a lack of discussion concerning the specific settings and characteristics of digital entrepreneurship in the smart city scenario. Nowadays, the concept of digital entrepreneurship is considered as a part of the digital entrepreneurial ecosystems (DEE) that provides an environment for effective entrepreneurial activities. Hence, the investigation on how DEE is interconnected with smart cities and how they both can contribute to their mutual development appears both timely and necessary. To reach this research objective, the authors, after giving a clear definition of each component of DEE based on an extensive literature review, consider its interconnection with the smart city model. The connection between the dimensions of a smart city and the structural constituents of DEE is also tracked, highlighting the contribution of each element to the development of a smart city. Through the creation of a comprehensive framework, the results of the paper show clearly that DEE is an inevitable part of a smart city environment. The research also covers the model of DEE engagement in smart city architecture.

Drinking water quality assessment is a major issue today, as it is crucial to supply safe drinking water to ensure the well-being of society. Predicting drinking water quality helps strengthen water management and fight water pollution; technologies and practices for drinking water quality assessment are continuously improving; artificial intelligence methods prove their efficiency in this domain. This research effort seeks a hierarchical fuzzy model for predicting drinking water quality in Rome (Italy). The Mamdani fuzzy inference system is applied with different defuzzification methods. The proposed model includes three fuzzy intermediate models and one fuzzy final model. Each model consists of three input parameters and 27 fuzzy rules. A water quality assessment model is developed with a dataset that considers nine parameters (alkalinity, hardness, pH, Ca, Mg, fluoride, sulphate, nitrates, and iron). These nine parameters of drinking water are anticipated to be within the acceptable limits set to protect human health. Fuzzy-logic-based methods have been demonstrated to be appropriate to address uncertainty and subjectivity in drinking water quality assessment; they are an effective method for managing complicated, uncertain water systems and predicting drinking water quality. The proposed method can provide an effective solution for complex systems; this method can be modified easily to improve performance.

Previous publications have shown that Italian consumers are willing to pay a premium price for certain categories of Made in Italy products. The premium price has proven to be higher in the food sector. This study provides an extensive literature review on the topic and aims to test a hypothesis regarding consumer preferences towards some Made in Italy food products of mass consumption (olive oil, meat and fish), with specific reference to the value systems that influence the purchase. This paper studies the correlation between the potential willingness to pay a premium price for the mentioned products and the characteristics of consumers’ sample. The results obtained confirm the willingness to pay for Made in Italy products and correlate the willingness to pay a premium price with the level of education of the respondents to the questionnaire. Thus, these findings show that consumers with a higher educational level tend to make more sustainable food choices and by doing so lean toward a sustainable lifestyle.

In the era of smart cities and digital transformation, ensuring digital inclusion has become a critical factor in fostering social cohesion and equitable urban development. While digital technology brings unprecedented opportunities for development, education, and civic engagement, barriers such as limited infrastructure, financial constraints, digital literacy gaps, and social exclusion continue to hinder full digital inclusion. This article explores the complex challenges of the digital divide and its impact on marginalized groups, including older adults, low-income households, migrants, and rural communities. Through a critical review of literature and policy analysis, this study examines key obstacles to digital inclusion in smart cities and evaluates the European Union’s response to these challenges through policy interventions, broadband expansion, digital skills programs, accessibility standards, and affordability measures. Additionally, the paper highlights strategies to enhance digital participation, such as citizen engagement, inclusive urban planning, and public-private partnerships. Through the analysis of EU initiatives and emerging policy approaches, this research contributes to the discourse on digital equity and provides insights into building smart, sustainable, and inclusive urban environments. The findings emphasize the need for integrated, cross-sectoral strategies to bridge the digital divide, ensuring that all citizens can access and benefit from the digital economy and society.

Due to a significant increase in electricity consumption globally, governments have to look and to identify better, more efficient and effective alternatives and sustainable energy sources to meet this high demand. This becomes more and more important in the context of implementing modern approaches such as those that might be applied in cases of smart cities and cultural and creative communities. Electricity can be produced based on conventional sources, but also on an emergent use of renewable sources. The electricity grid is usually designed as unidirectional. We consider that in case of smart cities and creative-innovative communities there is a need to implement mostly new smart grids that are bidirectional. This may allow and support the emergency of a new type of electricity user, called “prosumers”, who produces electricity from renewable sources, next uses & shares them smartly within the smart grid and finally stores them. Globally, photovoltaic energy prosumers are considered one of the most important actors in the energy transition and seem to be ready to introduce significant amounts of electricity within the grid. We anticipate that people living in households in smart cities and communities among most regions of the world will tend in the future to improve their self-consumption from the production of smart energy. This paper supports the idea that using mostly electricity from renewable alternative sources, especially solar, can be also developed with the help of households acting within smart cities and communities. The paper will also present briefly an overview of the scientific literature dedicated to this topic. We will also provide further interesting insights through a number of case studies representing good practices regarding prosumers in Italy and Romania.