Circular economy for food (CE) and food policies (FP) are two emerging but already prominent research areas, particularly when talking about the cities of the future. This paper analyzes the dynamics between these two fields of research, starting from review articles and the analysis of a case study, underlying the fundaments that FP and CE share. In particular, this paper focuses on using circular economy (CE) indicators and strategies to shape urban food policies (FP) to create a new business and political model towards sustainability. It introduces four converging perspectives, emerging from the literature, and analyzes how they have been integrated in the case study RePoPP (Re-design Project of Organic waste in Porta Palazzo market), a circular project born from the FP of the City of Turin (Italy). RePoPP is indeed a multi-actor project of urban circular food policies against food waste, which demonstrates how a circular approach can be the turning point in the creation of new food policies. This article wants to define for the first time a new research framework called “circular economy for food policy”, along with its characteristics: the application of a systemic approach and CE to problems and solutions, the need for a transdisciplinary and integrated project design for the 9R (responsibility, react, reduce, reuse, re-design, repair, recover, recycle, and rot), the use of food as a pivot of cross-sectoral change, and a new form of collaborative and integrated governance.

It is widely upheld that global food systems are unsustainable. Sustainable diets are gaining prominence as key components to entangle global food system challenges, as well as to transition towards the pathway of the 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Hence, sustainable and healthy diets are at the core of much research with the aim to bring together nutritional adequacy, cultural acceptability, environmental sustainability, economic affordability, and shape future consumption patterns. This article contributes to advancing knowledge on sustainable diets by proposing a True Cost Accounting method to assess the cost and impact of the adoption of a more sustainable and healthier diet, using Italy as an illustration. The research analyses the complexity of a diet from an environmental, health, and socioeconomic point of view and defines a new assessment framework that can be replicated and adapted to other contexts. Results show that in Italy, the adoption of a sustainable and healthy diet has a 47% lower carbon footprint and 25% lower water footprint than the current diet, while impacting 13% less on the average income and food monthly expenditure. Also, the desirable diet has a 21% lower impact on the sanitary costs related to cardiovascular disease. This study corroborates that the consumption of the desirable diet would provide a total cost saving of 741 EUR per year per capita, if we consider its impact on the environment, health, and socio-economic costs.

The city of Milan has developed a local food policy since 2014 which today is considered one of the most important food policies in Italy and a best practice at the international level. The aim of this research is to analyze the process that led to the implementation of the Milan food policy as a contribution to the agroecological transition of urban systems. The methods used to analyze this policy process (2014–2021), through the policy cycle framework, are a content analysis of key documents, interviews with key stakeholders and the analysis of lived experiences. The research highlights key information on the agenda setting, the policy formulation, the policy adoption, and the policy implementation, trying to break down the process, understand drivers, strengths, and challenges. The study highlights that institutionalization of the food policy has been the key to its success. Main results show that the engagement of international stakeholders and private funders have been important drivers of the agenda setting and formulation of the policy, while the presence of institutionalized policy entrepreneurs, as a permanent staff dedicated to food policies, was pivotal in the adoption of the policy and implementation of projects. The research also shows that the institutionalization, however, caused a lack of participative and cooperative policy development spaces, both with other departments of the Municipality and external local stakeholders, which resulted in their involvement for project design and consultation only.

This paper dives into the world of policy discourses to assess the extent to which the European agencies’ discourse of the post-2020 Common Agricultural Policy incorporates the innovative impulses presented in the Common Food Policy proposal of the International Panel of Experts on Sustainable Food Systems (IPES food). The discourse analysis performed on European Commission and IPES food documents, showed fundamentally different foci and goals, proposed actions and understanding of the concept of sustainability. However, although the differences between the two discourses are still very large, the analysis points out that some features of the IPES food discourse are starting to become part of that of the European Commission.

Research on organic consumers’ preferences has been given a lot of attention in the past, analysing in detail the motives of organic food consumption across the World. Less attention has been paid to the expectations of consumers change in the context of growing complexities of sustainable agriculture. The main goal of this study is to explore how the ongoing changes of the organic sector are reflected in consumers’ perspectives of organic agriculture and their preferences for organic food quality. The study was conducted in Italy with the use of the Q-methodology with a Q-set of 44 statements and a P-set of 20 participants. Three main groups of consumers were identified: “Mainstreaming for the better good”, “Critical supporters looking for more”, “Organic intensification supporters”. Despite each ideal-typical group showing different perceptions of the future of the organic movement, they all shared similar policy implications. Three main topics of discussion emerged from the results of this study which are: the expectations of the consumers towards the future of the organic movement, the role of trust in purchasing behaviors and the importance of supporting rural development.