From Food Waste to Market Value: Building Circular and Scalable Markets for Upcycled Food Systems

This Research Topic aims to examine the economic, behavioural, organisational, technological, supply-chain, and policy conditions that enable upcycled food systems to form, scale, and generate shared value. It will investigate how pricing, consumer demand, branding, certification, technology adoption, business-model innovation, entrepreneurial capabilities, and institutional arrangements influence market viability and commercialization.For the purposes of this Research Topic, we adopt the widely-used definition established by the Upcycled Food Association’s Definition Task Force (2020): upcycled foods “use ingredients that otherwise would not have gone to human consumption, are procured and produced using verifiable supply chains, and have a positive impact on the environment.” This distinguishes upcycling from general food-waste reduction or recycling — the recovered material becomes a marketed food or beverage ingredient, not compost, feed, or energy, and its provenance must be traceable.We extend this product-level definition to the systems level. An “upcycled food system,” as used here, refers to the network of actors, markets, and institutions — producers, processors, brand owners, retailers, certifiers, regulators, and consumers — that together enable underutilized food resources (agricultural residues, processing by-products, surplus and imperfect produce) to be converted into commercially viable, market-facing products at scale. The Research Topic’s focus is therefore on how that system forms and scales commercially, not on the conversion technologies themselves.Contributions may test or extend institutional, signalling, circular-economy, and dynamic-capabilities perspectives, while connecting stated consumer preferences with purchasing behaviour and linking resource recovery with outcomes for farmers, processors, retailers, consumers, and communities. The Research Topic also seeks evidence on sustainability trade-offs, value distribution, and the conditions under which upcycled food ventures can achieve both commercial resilience and meaningful environmental and social benefits.To gather further insights into market formation and the scaling of upcycled food systems, this Research Topic will consider agricultural residues, food-processing by-products, surplus and imperfect produce, and other underutilized food resources across diverse geographical and institutional contexts.Sustainable Food Processing already hosts several Research Topics on the technical conversion of food waste and by-products into value — for example, extraction and characterisation of bioactive compounds and biomaterials, biodegradable packaging, and renewable-energy- or AI-integrated processing systems. This Research Topic is deliberately positioned differently: it treats the conversion technology as a given input and asks the market-formation question instead — how do pricing, branding, certification, consumer trust, business-model design, and institutional arrangements determine whether an upcycled product survives contact with the market and scales. Where existing collections in the section ask “how do we technically convert waste into a product,” this one asks “how do we build a market and a business around it.” That makes it complementary rather than overlapping: submissions on extraction methods, material science, or process engineering belong in the existing technical Research Topics; submissions on market viability, commercialisation, consumer behaviour, business models, value-chain governance, and policy belong here.We welcome quantitative, qualitative, mixed-methods, modelling, review, and comparative contributions addressing, but not limited to, the following themes:- Techno-economic pathways and the commercial implications of upcycling technologies- Value creation, cost structures, profitability, pricing, and willingness to pay- Consumer acceptance, purchase behaviour, market segmentation, and demand development- Branding, positioning, communication, labelling, and consumer trust- Circular business models, entrepreneurship, innovation, and start-up development- New product development, commercialization, and venture scaling- Reverse logistics, traceability, and circular supply-chain integration- Relationships among farmers, processors, manufacturers, retailers, and consumers- Farmer participation, producer livelihoods, and value capture across the chain- Food safety, certification, standards, regulation, and institutional incentives- Technology adoption and investment decisions in upcycled food production- Sustainability assessment, resource efficiency, greenhouse-gas reduction, and circularity- Sustainability trade-offs and resilience at scale- Smallholder, small and medium-sized enterprise, and emerging-economy models- Econometric, panel-data, discrete-choice, conjoint, systems-modelling, and life-cycle approaches- Conceptual frameworks linking resource recovery, market formation, and scalingExpected Academic Contributions- An integrated conceptual framework linking resource recovery to market scaling with explicit feedback loops- Empirical evidence on how circular/waste-based ventures scale, addressing an explicitly acknowledged literature gap- Theory-testing and theory-extension using institutional, signalling and dynamic-capabilities perspectives currently under-applied in this field- New behavioural evidence linking stated attitudes/WTP to actual purchase behaviourExpected Managerial / Industry Contributions- Evidence-based guidance for processors and brand owners on pricing, positioning and certification investment- Scaling playbooks for waste-based ventures grounded in empirical rather than anecdotal evidence- Value-chain design principles that improve farmer/producer value capturePolicy Relevance- Findings can inform food-safety and certification policy, food-waste-reduction targets, and support for- SME/smallholder participation in circular food value chains, particularly in agriculture-dependent economies.Potential Target Audience- Agricultural and food economists- Food scientists and food-process engineers with an economics/market interest- Marketing and consumer-behaviour researchers- Supply-chain and operations-management scholars- Entrepreneurship and innovation-management researchers- Policy analysts and food-system practitioners- Industry R&D, product-development and sustainability teams Topic editors: Indrajit Ghosal, Dr Pragya Singh, Sudhir Rana Source: https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/85404/from-food-waste-to-market-value-building-circular-and-scalable-markets-for-upcycled-food-systems