Regenerative gastronomic tourism and short food supply chains: a SOR model approach

1 Introduction

Sustainable food systems depend equally on transformations in production and shifts in consumption patterns, trust formation, and market relationships (Dordai et al., 2026; Popescu et al., 2025). Traditional gastronomy, rooted in local ingredients and place-based practices, shapes consumer preferences and strengthens demand for locally differentiated foods (Guerrero et al., 2009). At the intersection of food heritage and sustainable consumption, regenerative gastronomic tourism has emerged as a mechanism to connect consumers with SFSCs in ways that transcend conventional market logic (Gerke et al., 2024a,b; Medina et al., 2025).

Regenerative tourism extends beyond sustainability by actively restoring the socio ecological fabric of host communities, promoting food sovereignty, and redistributing economic value toward vulnerable links in the value chain (Kastenholz et al., 2025; Medina et al., 2025). Applied to gastronomic contexts, it reframes food tourism from consumption-oriented activity into a relational practice embedding visitors within living food systems (Le Minh and Anh, 2025). Unlike hedonic food tourism, regenerative gastronomic experiences immerse visitors in biocultural narratives, direct interactions with smallholders, and the co-creation of territorial meaning (Gerke et al., 2024a,b).

To avoid conceptual conflation, regenerative gastronomic tourism is defined operationally as travel-centered engagement with food systems yielding demonstrable net-positive territorial outcomes in at least two of five dimensions: (i) ecological restoration; (ii) community governance; (iii) equitable benefit distribution; (iv) food sovereignty; and (v) biocultural restoration. This threshold distinguishes the construct from adjacent forms: sustainable food tourism (harm minimization without restoration), community-based tourism (local ownership without food-system regeneration), agritourism (monetization of farm experiences without net-positive guarantees), culinary tourism (sensory-experiential consumption), and heritage tourism (interpretation of the past without present-day regenerative effects). Experiences below this threshold are cited in this review only as comparative or contextual evidence, and the criterion was applied during full-text eligibility screening (Section 2.2).

Latin American contexts offer rich empirical settings given the entanglement of gastronomic heritage, indigenous food systems, and community-based tourism (Vazquez-Medina and Medina, 2020; Gálvez et al., 2017). Mexico, with its UNESCO-recognized traditional cuisine and diverse biocultural landscapes, exemplifies how regenerative gastronomic tourism can strengthen SFSCs while preserving ancestral knowledge (Naumov and Costandachi, 2021; Galán Cuevas et al., 2019).

While the literature has documented the cultural benefits of gastronomic tourism, the psychological and behavioral mechanisms translating tourist experiences into stable, recurring demand for SFSCs remain fragmented. Recent systematic reviews have synthesized determinants of consumer behavior in SFSCs (Herzig and Zander, 2025) and sustainable healthy food consumption in tourism (Salehi et al., 2025), identifying gaps in understanding how experiential tourism contexts shape long-term consumption behaviors.

This scoping review addresses this gap by synthesizing recent evidence (2016–2026) through the SOR framework (Mehrabian and Russell, 1974; Figure 1), which posits that environmental stimuli activate internal cognitive and affective states that drive behavioral responses. We examine how regenerative gastronomic experiences (S) shape consumer perceptions, authenticity, territorial identity, trust, and multidimensional consumption value (O), and how these translate into intention-based and, where documented, observed market-relevant outcomes for SFSCs: willingness to pay, post-trip purchasing, and digital advocacy (R).

2 Methods

2.1 Search strategy and eligibility criteria

This review is reported according to the PRISMA-ScR extension (Tricco et al., 2018). The initial search was conducted between 12 May and 31 July 2026 across Google Scholar, Semantic Scholar, and open-access databases (DOAJ, SciELO, Redalyc) using three Boolean search blocks aligned with the SOR framework: (B1) (“regenerative tourism” OR “gastronomic tourism” OR “culinary tourism”) AND (“short food supply chains” OR “alternative food networks” OR “local food”); (B2) (“stimulus-organism-response” OR “perceived authenticity” OR “territorial identity” OR “social identity” OR “consumption value” OR “trust” OR “groundedness”) AND (“food” OR “gastronomy” OR “tourism”); (B3) (“willingness to pay” OR “post-trip behavior” OR “e-WOM” OR “loyalty” OR “ethical consumption”) AND (“local food” OR “traditional food” OR “heritage food”). An updated search was run in September 2026 to capture recently published literature. Eligibility criteria were: (i) peer-reviewed empirical or conceptual articles; (ii) publication 2016–2026, with emphasis on 2020–2026; (iii) explicit linkage among gastronomic tourism, consumer behavior, and SFSC outcomes; (iv) English or Spanish.

2.2 Selection, data charting, and synthesis

Identification yielded 412 records (Google Scholar, 231; Semantic Scholar, 96; DOAJ/SciELO/Redalyc, 85). After removing 144 duplicates, 268 titles/abstracts were screened (176 excluded); 92 full texts were assessed and 42 excluded (no explicit SFSC link, n = 18; no consumer/SOR focus, n = 12; not empirical/conceptual, n = 6; out of scope, n = 6), leaving 50 sources included from the initial search. Screening, data charting, and synthesis were performed by two authors (MCAR and ECC) working independently; disagreements were resolved by consensus. The charting form captured country, setting, design, sample, gastronomic context, SFSC type, SOR construct, measured outcome, principal finding, and evidence limitation (Table 1). Findings were synthesized thematically and mapped onto the SOR framework (stimuli, organism states, economic and social responses). Two additional records (Au Yong et al., 2025; Paredes-Aguirre et al., 2026) were identified through backward citation searching (snowballing) of the reference lists of included studies during the September 2026 update, screened against the same eligibility criteria, and incorporated into the charted corpus, yielding a final sample of 52 sources (Figure 2).

Table 1. Characteristics of the 52 included sources of evidence.

Each source was charted according to the PRISMA-ScR data-charting form: country, research setting, design, sample, gastronomic context, SFSC type, SOR construct, measured outcome, principal finding, and evidence limitation. Source: Own elaboration.

3 Regenerative gastronomic experiences as stimuli (S)

The SOR framework positions environmental and experiential cues as triggers of internal consumer processing. In regenerative gastronomic tourism, stimuli are immersive, multisensory, and relational encounters that embed the visitor within a living food system. Increasingly, these stimuli are hybrid, combining embodied territorial experiences with curated digital content (Soonsan and Kattiyapornpong, 2026; Abdul Latip et al., 2026).

3.1 Sensory immersion and heritage cooking workshops

Regenerative gastronomic experiences center on participatory activities such as heritage cooking workshops, farm-to-table tastings, and harvest rituals that engage multiple senses simultaneously (Gerke et al., 2024a,b). These encounters expose tourists to the materiality of ancestral ingredients, the texture of heirloom maize, the aroma of wood-fired preparation, and the visual richness of a milpa landscape, creating what Koufodontis and Gaki (2026) term “micro-level authenticity cues.” Participatory gastronomy activates embodied cognition, anchoring memories in sensory detail that persist beyond the trip (Stone and Zou, 2025). In Xochimilco’s chinampera zone, visitors who participate in traditional chinampa agriculture report heightened emotional connections to the food they consume (Medina et al., 2025). Similar dynamics have been documented in agritourism guesthouses in Romania’s Caraș-Severin County, where tourists’ perceptions of food quality are shaped by proximity to production sites and direct engagement with farming families (Ibric et al., 2026). Creative initiatives in Mexico further expand these formats through community cooking classes and heritage food festivals that position tourists as active participants (Naumov and Costandachi, 2021).

3.2 Direct producer–consumer interaction in

3.2.1 Alternative markets

A defining feature of SFSCs is relational exchange: producers and consumers interact face-to-face, reducing information asymmetry and building trust through repeated contact (Gerke et al., 2024a,b). In alternative markets such as tianguis, farmers’ markets, and community-supported agriculture schemes, the producer’s narrative becomes a stimulus in itself. Tourists who engage in direct dialogue with smallholders receive authenticity signals that no label can replicate (Bakr et al., 2025). In the Sierra Juárez of Oaxaca, agrotourism initiatives connect tourists with smallholder producers through farm visits and participatory harvest experiences, embedding visitors within living food systems where ancestral agricultural knowledge becomes simultaneously product and narrative (Galán Cuevas et al., 2019). Entrepreneurial initiatives in regional hospitality increasingly embrace regenerative principles, designing experiences that prioritize community benefit and cultural preservation over extractive profit maximization (Gerke et al., 2024a,b). These interactions function as quality signals in the SOR model, reducing perceived risk regarding sustainability attributes.

3.3 Biocultural narratives and territorial storytelling

Regenerative tourism incorporates storytelling as a deliberate stimulus: guides, producers, and community elders share narratives about the origins of ingredients, the significance of preparation rituals, and the ecological relationships sustaining traditional food systems (Medina et al., 2025). These biocultural narratives activate the epistemic dimension of consumption value, the desire for novelty, knowledge, and cognitive stimulation (Guan et al., 2026). When tourists learn that a specific recipe encodes centuries of indigenous botanical knowledge, the food item is re-signified from commodity to cultural artifact. Such re-signification becomes meaningful when engaging indigenous values prioritizing relationality, reciprocity, and intergenerational stewardship over extractive market logic (Sheldon, 2025). Recent evidence from coastal Ecuador further demonstrates that community culinary heritage functions as a source of social recognition and perceived emotional benefits, activating the social and affective dimensions of consumption value beyond instrumental market exchange (Paredes-Aguirre et al., 2026).

Beyond narrative, the gastronomic dimension of regenerative tourism is materially anchored in culinary knowledge transmission and biocultural production. Heritage recipes and traditional preparation techniques, nixtamalization, wood-fired cooking, fermentation, are transmitted intergenerationally, predominantly by women and community knowledge holders, and are enacted in situ when tourists participate in harvest, processing, and cooking (Vazquez-Medina and Medina, 2020; Sheldon, 2025). These practices depend on ingredient biodiversity and seasonality: heirloom maize varieties, wild greens (quelites), and chinampa vegetables tie menus to agroecological calendars rather than to global supply chains (Medina et al., 2025). Terroir and geographical indications institutionalize this place-based specificity, converting localized agrobiodiversity and know-how into protected collective assets (Garavaglia and Mariani, 2017; Ghose and Ali, 2025; Mathew et al., 2025). At the operational level, menu localization and local procurement by restaurants and guesthouses extend the stimulus beyond the farm gate, embedding farmers, cooks, artisans, and market vendors within the experiential value chain (Gerke et al., 2024a,b; Pearson et al., 2024).

4 Internal consumer states: the organism (O)

The organism component captures cognitive and affective processing between stimulus exposure and behavioral response. The SOR framework is widely validated across food consumption contexts (Liu and Zheng, 2019; Hsu et al., 2021; Jun and Yoon, 2024; Triki and Masmoudi, 2026). In regenerative gastronomic tourism, three interrelated internal states mediate the translation of experience into market behavior.

4.1 Perceived authenticity: micro and macro factors

Authenticity perception is not monolithic. Koufodontis and Gaki (2026) distinguish between micro-level factors (individual sensory experiences, personal memories, and subjective evaluations) and macro-level factors (institutional narratives, cultural heritage frameworks, community endorsement). Wareebor et al. (2025) demonstrate empirically that perceived authenticity toward local restaurants significantly predicts tourist behavioral intentions, including willingness to recommend and revisit. Recent research extends this framework by identifying groundedness, a felt sense of rootedness and connection to place, as a critical affective outcome shaping behavioral intentions toward local products (Triki and Masmoudi, 2026). The relationship between authenticity and advocacy has been validated across diverse cultural contexts: Huang (2024) shows that brand authenticity and sensory experiences significantly predict word-of-mouth, while in traditional culinary businesses, service quality and trust operate as critical mediators between experience and purchase decisions (Hossain et al., 2024). Conversely, perceived risk operates as a barrier to sustainable food tourism experiences, which regenerative encounters mitigate through transparency and direct producer interaction (An et al., 2023).

Regenerative gastronomic experiences can temporarily activate “in-group” belonging: tourists adopt the values, symbols, and consumption practices of the visited territory (Bartels and Onwezen, 2014). Foundational work by Abrahamse et al. (2009) demonstrates that threatened identities connected to cultural heritage can powerfully motivate sustainable consumption, positioning identity-protective consumption as cultural resistance. Building on this, Zheng et al. (2023) identify a serial mediation pathway in which social identity enhances green perceived value, reduces psychological distance, and ultimately increases green food purchase intentions. Self-congruity, the alignment between consumers’ self-image and the symbolic attributes of local foods, complements these collective processes at the individual level (Shin et al., 2016). In Xochimilco, visitors who internalize the chinampera identity exhibit stronger ethical consumption intentions than those motivated solely by culinary curiosity (Medina et al., 2025), particularly when experiences engage indigenous values of reciprocity and intergenerational stewardship (Sheldon, 2025). Participatory governance further reinforces identity activation through ethical co-design in community-based tourism (Avendaño-Rito et al., 2026).

4.2 Cultural knowledge, trust, and multidimensional consumption value

We distinguish territorial identity, place-based belonging and attachment to the biocultural landscape, from social identity, group-based self-categorization with the community of producers and knowledge holders (Bartels and Onwezen, 2014; Zheng et al., 2023). Territorial identity anchors the consumer to the place of origin, whereas social identity aligns the consumer’s self-concept with the values of the producer community; both operate as complementary pathways of identity activation.”

Regenerative gastronomic experiences can temporarily activate “in-group” belonging: tourists adopt the values, symbols, and consumption practices of the visited territory (Bartels and Onwezen, 2014). Foundational work by Abrahamse et al. (2009) demonstrates that threatened identities connected to cultural heritage can powerfully motivate sustainable consumption, positioning identity-protective consumption as cultural resistance. Building on this, Zheng et al. (2023) identify a serial mediation pathway in which social identity enhances green perceived value, reduces psychological distance, and ultimately increases green food purchase intentions. Self-congruity—the alignment between consumers’ self-image and the symbolic attributes of local foods—complements these collective processes at the individual level (Shin et al., 2016). In Xochimilco, visitors who internalize the chinampera identity exhibit stronger ethical consumption intentions than those motivated solely by culinary curiosity (Medina et al., 2025), particularly when experiences engage indigenous values of reciprocity and intergenerational stewardship (Sheldon, 2025). Participatory governance further reinforces identity activation through ethical co-design in community-based tourism (Avendaño-Rito et al., 2026).

4.3 Cultural knowledge, trust, and multidimensional consumption value

Bakr et al. (2025) introduce cultural knowledge as a critical moderator: tourists with higher baseline knowledge about local food heritage process authenticity cues more deeply, generating stronger sustainable behavioral intentions. This interacts with trust formation built through direct producer interaction. Participatory Guarantee Systems (PGS),alternative certification schemes based on direct stakeholder involvement, exemplify how relational trust is generated: consumers develop confidence not through institutional labels but through ongoing engagement with producers and communities, as documented in Mexico’s organic sector (Nelson et al., 2016). The mediation of consumer desire in purchase intentions has been empirically validated in Mexican contexts (Leyva-Hernández et al., 2021), suggesting that emotional and identity-based mechanisms drive ethical food choices. These mechanisms converge within the multidimensional consumption value framework (Sheth et al., 1991; Guan et al., 2026): regenerative experiences simultaneously activate functional value (quality, freshness), emotional value (nostalgia, awe), social value (ethical signaling), epistemic value (learning), and conditional value (the uniqueness of the tourist context). Consumer segmentation approaches grounded in TPB have identified distinct profiles of local food consumers differentiated by attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control (Kumar and Smith, 2018), while sustainability consciousness further differentiates tourists who translate experiences into green purchasing behaviors (Gulzar et al., 2024).

5 Market-relevant responses for short food supply chains (R)

The Theory of Planned Behavior provides the mechanistic bridge between internal states and response: attitudes toward local food crystallize consumption value, subjective norms capture the social-identity signaling of ethical consumption, and perceived behavioral control reflects the availability of SFSC channels (digital platforms, subscriptions) that enable or constrain post-trip purchasing (Ajzen, 1991; Kumar and Smith, 2018; Shin et al., 2016).

The response component translates internal states into observable market behaviors. For SFSCs, these responses signal the potential for tourist encounters to generate sustained demand supporting smallholder livelihoods, although most evidence captures stated intentions rather than observed purchasing. The translation of identity-based motivations into market responses is further supported by TPB applications to local food consumption (Shin et al., 2016; Kumar and Smith, 2018) and by evidence that sustainability stimuli activate affective and cognitive states shaping consumer responses in foodservice contexts (Jun and Yoon, 2024; Liu and Zheng, 2019; Hsu et al., 2021).

5.1 Willingness to pay and price premia

A key economic question for SFSCs is whether regenerative gastronomic experiences increase consumers’ willingness to pay (WTP) beyond conventional benchmarks. Garavaglia and Mariani (2017) demonstrate that Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) certifications generate significant price premia for Italian dry-cured ham, suggesting that consumers value institutionalized authenticity signals. Beyond European cases, Ghose and Ali (2025) analyze how geographical indication (GI) protection preserves culinary heritage across diverse cheese varieties worldwide, while Mathew et al. (2025) examines the role of GIs in promoting gastronomic sustainable tourism in India. Regenerative tourism extends this logic: research on Australian wine regions demonstrates significant WTP premiums for products associated with regenerative place-making practices (Pearson et al., 2024), and studies of American tourists reveal that cultural authenticity and environmental values jointly predict premium pricing acceptance for traditional foods (Gálvez et al., 2017). When tourists experience production processes firsthand, they internalize the costs and cultural labor embedded in the product, reducing price sensitivity (Stone and Zou, 2025).

5.2 Post-trip purchasing, repeat engagement, and loyalty

The most critical challenge for SFSCs is sustaining demand after the tourist departs. Stone and Zou (2025) identify purchase involvement during the trip as a strong predictor of post-travel behaviors, including online reordering and subscription to local food networks. Guan et al. (2026) further demonstrate that integrative consumption value generated during gastronomic experiences shapes post-purchase behavioral intentions, particularly when digital channels maintain the relational connection between consumer and producer. Jalali et al. (2026) show that local food consumption value in family-owned restaurants significantly predicts tourist satisfaction and behavioral intentions, including revisit intentions and positive word-of-mouth. Thus, SFSCs benefit most when tourism experiences couple with post-trip digital infrastructure extending the relational bond beyond the physical visit.

Loyalty constitutes the most durable behavioral response: beyond single repurchases, it comprises attitudinal commitment (preference for origin products), behavioral repetition (subscriptions, reorders), and advocacy. Evidence indicates that loyalty in regenerative contexts is sustained by relational trust and identity continuity rather than by price or convenience (Stone and Zou, 2025; Jalali et al., 2026).

5.3 Digital advocacy and e-WOM

Tourists who undergo regenerative gastronomic experiences frequently become digital advocates, generating electronic word-of-mouth (e-WOM) through social media posts, online reviews, and blog narratives. The experience economy framework provides a robust lens for this phenomenon: Lai et al. (2021) demonstrate that tourists’ destination culinary experiences across the four experience dimensions significantly predict e-WOM generation intention. Wareebor et al. (2025) show that perceived authenticity drives recommendation intentions, while Bakr et al. (2025) find that green consumerism, activated by authentic cultural knowledge, translates into willingness to promote sustainable gastronomic practices.

Cultural knowledge operates as a moderator of the stimulus–organism pathway: tourists with deeper heritage knowledge process authenticity cues more elaborately, strengthening trust and value formation (Bakr et al., 2025). Digital continuity moderates the organism–response pathway by sustaining identity salience after departure (Guan et al., 2026; Soonsan and Kattiyapornpong, 2026).

Social media influencers have emerged as critical intermediaries amplifying advocacy dynamics (Soonsan and Kattiyapornpong, 2026), while validated measurement instruments allow systematic assessment of social media’s role in culinary heritage travel (Abdul Latip et al., 2026). For small producers, tourist-generated e-WOM functions as a reputation-building mechanism that reduces information asymmetry and expands market reach at minimal cost.

6 Discussion

This work demonstrates that the SOR framework provides a robust analytical lens for understanding how regenerative gastronomic tourism catalyzes sustainable demand for SFSCs (Figure 1). Immersive in-situ and digital stimuli (S) activate internal cognitive and affective states (O)—perceived authenticity, territorial identity, groundedness, and multidimensional consumption value, which subsequently drive market-relevant responses (R): willingness to pay premiums, post-trip purchasing, and digital advocacy.

Consistent with PRISMA-ScR guidance, no formal risk-of-bias instrument was applied, as scoping reviews map evidence rather than appraise it. However, we graded claims into three evidentiary tiers (measured findings, interpretations, propositions), and we note that the predominance of cross-sectional self-report designs constrains causal inference and likely inflates intention–behavior consistency due to social desirability bias.

Interpretive caution and evidence grading. A careful source–claim audit reveals that the reviewed corpus measures predominantly behavioral intentions rather than observed market outcomes: self-reported willingness to pay, revisit intention, electronic word-of-mouth, and stated post-trip purchasing constitute the overwhelming majority of dependent variables, while observed purchasing, producer income, supply-chain performance, and verified territorial regeneration are rarely captured. Accordingly, we distinguish three evidentiary tiers throughout this review: (i) empirical findings directly measured in the source studies (introduced with verbs such as demonstrate, report, find); (ii) our interpretations that extend beyond the immediate data (signaled by suggest, indicate, we argue); and (iii) propositions for future research formulated in Section 6.1 as explicitly testable hypotheses (introduced with we propose). Claims concerning stable demand, sustained price premiums, and demonstrable improvements to smallholder livelihoods are therefore framed as intention-supported potential rather than demonstrated outcomes, consistent with the predominantly cross-sectional and self-report nature of the evidence base.

Several limitations of the reviewed corpus must be acknowledged. The evidence base remains methodologically heterogeneous and geographically concentrated: most studies are cross-sectional, rely on convenience samples, and are concentrated in Asia and Latin America, limiting generalizability. The predominance of self-reported behavioral intentions rather than observed purchasing behaviors raises concerns about social desirability bias. Furthermore, the rapid inclusion of very recent literature (2025–2026) precludes full assessment of citation impact and replication.

Table 2 positions the present review relative to the most recent syntheses on SFSC consumer behavior (Herzig and Zander, 2025), sustainable healthy food consumption in tourism (Salehi et al., 2025), gastronomic tourism trends (Dordai et al., 2026), and consumption value in tourism (Guan et al., 2026). Unlike these reviews, the present scoping review integrates the SOR model with consumption value and social identity perspectives to explain how regenerative gastronomic experiences translate into SFSC-relevant market behaviors, and it formalizes this integration as four testable propositions.

Table 2. Comparison of the present scoping review with previous reviews on gastronomic tourism, SFSCs, and sustainable food consumption.

SLR = systematic literature review; SOR = Stimulus–Organism–Response; SFSC = short food supply chain; TPB = Theory of Planned Behavior; NR = not reported. Source: Own elaboration.

Despite these caveats, critical gaps limit the consolidation of this phenomenon. First, the longitudinal durability of tourist loyalty remains unknown; most studies capture immediate post-trip responses (Wareebor et al., 2025; Stone and Zou, 2025), necessitating panel designs to track long-term engagement. Second, the digital mediation of post-trip infrastructure requires further exploration to identify which e-commerce and relational platforms best sustain the SOR chain once the tourist leaves the territory (Guan et al., 2026). Third, community sovereignty and the risk of folklorization demand critical attention: gastronomic tourism may commodify ancestral knowledge, displacing benefits from communities to intermediaries (Medina et al., 2025).

Participatory organic certification in Mexico offers an alternative approach to maintaining label integrity while preserving local autonomy (Nelson et al., 2010), and multilevel governance frameworks identify institutional barriers preventing communities from capturing value (Leyva-Hernández et al., 2026). Future research must examine how governance models, community cooperatives, municipal policies, and territorial certification schemes, can protect indigenous intellectual property and prevent the staging of authenticity, drawing on indigenous epistemologies centered on reciprocity and relationality (Sheldon, 2025). Equally critical is the governance of the ancestral and Indigenous knowledge mobilized by gastronomic tourism. Culinary heritage is collectively produced, yet tourism markets frequently extract it without mechanisms of ownership, prior consent, or benefit sharing; cooks, farmers, artisans, and women knowledge holders remain among the least remunerated links of the value chain (Medina et al., 2025; Sheldon, 2025).

Future research and policy should therefore examine collective-rights and intellectual-property regimes, consent protocols for the commercial use of recipes and rituals, and the power asymmetries between communities, intermediaries, and digital platforms—assessing whether participatory schemes such as Participatory Guarantee Systems and geographical indications redistribute benefits or merely certify extraction (Nelson et al., 2016; Leyva-Hernández et al., 2026). Fourth, existing evidence remains geographically concentrated in Mexico, Thailand, Australia, and China, with limited representation of Andean, Central American, and Sub-Saharan African contexts. Two additional sources from Ecuador (Paredes-Aguirre et al., 2026) and Southeast Asia (Au Yong et al., 2025) were identified through citation searching during the September 2026 update and charted into the corpus (N = 52) to partially address this gap, although broader systematic coverage of these regions is recommended for future scoping reviews.

For producers and market organizers, the key implication is that regenerative tourism is not merely a promotional strategy but a relational infrastructure: the quality of the tourist–producer encounter determines the depth of consumer commitment. Beyond this relational core, regenerative gastronomic tourism reconfigures the political economy of SFSCs. Direct tourist encounters strengthen producer bargaining power by reducing dependence on intermediaries: face-to-face sales at tianguis, farm gates, and heritage festivals allow smallholders to capture a larger share of final value and to narrate quality in their own terms, limiting economic leakage toward wholesalers and platform operators (Gerke et al., 2024a,b). Cooperative ownership and community governance determine whether captured value is reinvested locally: cooperatives and participatory certification schemes convert individual premiums into collective assets such as shared logistics, cold chains, and digital storefronts (Nelson et al., 2010; Leyva-Hernández et al., 2026). Operational constraints nonetheless condition these gains: logistics costs, harvest seasonality, and supply continuity limit smallholders’ ability to meet fluctuating tourist demand, while dependence on booking apps and social-media algorithms creates new asymmetries that replicate intermediary control under a technological guise (Guan et al., 2026; Soonsan and Kattiyapornpong, 2026). Policymakers should therefore pair demand-side stimulation with supply-side infrastructure and governance: cooperative logistics, seasonal menu planning, platform cooperativism, and community data sovereignty. Finally, we propose a minimal indicator set for evaluating local outcomes: economic (share of tourist spending retained locally, producer price premia, cooperative reinvestment), social (participation of women and knowledge holders in decision-making, intergenerational transmission of culinary practices), and ecological (agrobiodiversity, soil and water regeneration, seasonal procurement ratios).

6.1 Testable propositions for future research

Building on the integrated framework (Figure 1), we formulate four explicit propositions:

P1. Perceived authenticity and trust mediate the relationship between regenerative gastronomic stimuli (in-situ and digital) and market-relevant responses (willingness to pay, post-trip purchasing, and advocacy).

P2. Cultural knowledge and digital continuity moderate the organism–response relationship: tourists with higher heritage knowledge and sustained post-trip digital engagement translate internal states into market behaviors more strongly.

P3. Perceived greenwashing operates as a boundary condition of the authenticity–trust pathway: when sustainability claims are perceived as superficial, authenticity cues fail to activate trust and the S → O → R chain is attenuated.

P4. Community governance determines whether consumer-side value translates into producer and territorial benefits: under cooperative ownership and participatory certification, consumer value is associated with higher local value capture; under intermediary-controlled chains, it is not.

7 Conclusion

This scoping review demonstrates that the Stimulus–Organism–Response framework, enriched by consumption value and social identity perspectives, provides a coherent analytical lens for understanding how regenerative gastronomic tourism can catalyze sustainable demand for short food supply chains. Immersive in-situ and digital stimuli activate cognitive and affective states, perceived authenticity, territorial and social identity, groundedness, cultural knowledge, and trust, that translate into economic and social responses, from willingness to pay premiums to digital advocacy. Because the evidence base remains predominantly intention-based and cross-sectional, these pathways should be read as a structured research agenda rather than as demonstrated causal chains: the four propositions formulated in Section 6.1 specify the mediators, moderators, and governance conditions that future empirical work must test. Ultimately, strengthening short food supply chains through regenerative gastronomic tourism requires a paradigm shift, from treating food as a commodity to recognizing it as a living expression of territory, identity, and intergenerational knowledge, supported by governance models that protect community sovereignty and redistribute value to the producers and knowledge holders who sustain it.

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Footnotes

Edited by: Leonardo Ramos Lopez, Universidad Autónoma de Baja California, Ensenada, Mexico

Reviewed by: Samet Mısır, Ardahan University, Türkiye

José Manuel Camarena Onofre, Universidad Autónoma de Baja California, Ensenada, Mexico