Planning Grant: Engineering Research Center for Food Resiliency through Engineered Supply Chains (FRESCH)

工程研究中心的规划赠款竞争是作为ERC计划内的试点招标运行。规划赠款不需要作为整个ERC竞争的一部分，但旨在建立团队之间的能力，以规划聚合，中心规模的工程研究。当代食品供应链是优化的高容量，低成本和全球范围内，但继续失败：食物沙漠和食源性疾病持续存在;小生产者面临参与障碍;及自然灾害（包括COVID-19大流行）扰乱生产及交付。工程师传统上系统地、顺序地、渐进地处理问题。然而，这些方法不太容易管理食品系统的崩溃，因为食品系统具有根深蒂固的社会和文化因素（口味，历史，身份和价值观），这些因素无视技术优化并排除停止规则。FRESCH ERC的目标社会影响是通过避免或减轻中断以及利用机会扩大食品种类和盈利能力来改善国家的健康和繁荣。ERC目标的一个重要方面是将思维从线性“食品供应链”转变为灵活和有弹性的“食品网络”。粮食网络内的复原力意味着，无论发生什么破坏，其负面影响都会较小，而正面影响则会较大。投资于食品行业的适应能力将平衡普遍存在的“精简”粮食系统的趋势，这种系统往往脆弱，不符合可持续发展目标，如增加粮食生产者的收入和确保所有人有体面的工作。并改变工业、农业和生物系统工程的教育和实践，以纳入复原力的概念。弹性不仅仅是简单的稳健性或反弹能力，它还包括应对无法预见的关键情况或趋势的优雅的可扩展性和持续的适应性。规划补助金将提供机制和资源，以特许ERC解决小规模食品网络中的食品安全问题，并开发食品网络挑战模拟，以培训学生和利益相关者了解食品系统的相互关联性。我们的智慧规划方法基于社区资本框架。这种系统方法考虑到所有相关的人力、社会、自然、金融、建筑、文化和政治资本，并全面部署它们，以最大限度地促进社区发展。将弹性思维和社区资本相结合是确定优先事项和选择有影响力的工程研究和开发项目的融合方法。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The Planning Grants for Engineering Research Centers competition was run as a pilot solicitation within the ERC program. Planning grants are not required as part of the full ERC competition, but intended to build capacity among teams to plan for convergent, center-scale engineering research.Contemporary food supply chains are optimized for high volume, low cost, and global reach—but continue to fail: food deserts and food-borne illness persist; small producers face barriers to participation; and natural disasters (including the COVID-19 pandemic) disrupt production and deliveries. Engineers traditionally approach problems systematically, sequentially, and incrementally. Breakdowns in food systems, however, are less manageable by these methods because food systems have engrained social and cultural elements (tastes, histories, identities, and values) which defy technical optimization and preclude stopping rules. The targeted societal impact of the FRESCH ERC is to improve the nation’s health and prosperity by both avoiding or mitigating disruptions and by exploiting opportunities to expand food variety and profitability. An important aspect of the ERC’s target goals is to shift thinking from linear “food supply chains” to flexible and resilient “food networks.” Resilience within food networks means that whatever disruptions do occur will have smaller negative impacts or greater positive ones. Investment in adaptive capacity within the food industry will balance the pervasive drive for “leaner” food systems, which are often brittle and not aligned with sustainable development goals, such as increasing the incomes of food producers and ensuring decent work for all.The FRESCH ERC will develop technology to serve all nodes of food systems; reduce food insecurity and waste; expand the criteria for system performance beyond technical efficiency; and transform education and practice in industrial, agricultural, and biosystems engineering to include concepts of resilience. Resilience is more than simple robustness or the ability to rebound—it includes graceful extendibility and sustained adaptability in response to critical situations or trends that cannot be foreseen. The planning grant will provide mechanisms and resources to charter an ERC to address issues of food safety in small-scale food networks and develop a food network challenge simulation to train students and stakeholders about the interconnectedness of food systems. Our intellectual approach to planning is grounded in the Community Capitals Framework. This systems approach considers all relevant human, social, natural, financial, built, cultural, and political capitals, and deploys them holistically to greatest impact for community development. Combining resilience thinking and community capitals is a convergent approach to define priorities and select impactful engineering research and development projects.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.