Complete Journal Scientia et PRAXIS Vol.03. No.05-2023: Co-published with CIAD-CONAHCYT: Food and its relationships with regional development: Problems and perspectives.

Abstract

For the Academia Mexicana de investigación y Docencia en Innovación (AMIDI) through the editorial board of the journal Scientia et PRAXIS in Volume 03, Number 05, corresponding to the period from January to June 2023, the co-edition made with the Centro de Investigación en Alimentación y Desarrollo CIAD de CONAHCYT, with major title:

Food and its relationships with regional development: Problems and perspectives

It represented a great opportunity to convene original and unpublished scientific papers on how transdisciplinary activity drives sustainable development with a social impact, highlighting contributions both in the field of knowledge (Scientia) and the field of application (Praxis). With this, we take the opportunity to provide the CIAD- CONAHCYT authorities with the facilities provided so that this number could be carried out.

Thus, the first article is presented, which estimates variations in the quarterly expenditure of Mexican households on foods with high energy content for 2016-2020 in three types of foods in this category, segmenting them by the socioeconomic level of the population. The findings make it possible to ensure that spending on the products mentioned above increases in the 2018-2020 period, except for packaged bread, a fact that coincides with the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic and the new front seal labeling policy. The originality of this article lies in the fact that it is the transdisciplinary result of combining three approaches: nutritional content of food, implementation of the food labeling policy, and the expenditure of Mexican households. It is concluded that there is no significant variation in household spending on soft drinks and sugary drinks. The study only compares variations in spending by decile and does not isolate the effect of such policies, thus providing opportunities to develop future research.

The second article analyzes the environmental degradation of water and soil in areas with intensive agricultural practices in Sonora, Mexico, in 2001-2021. Reviews databases and federal geographic information systems to identify environmental indicators and the corresponding statistical analysis. Its main findings indicate a high prevalence of water supply by aquifers and a predominance of medium-intensive agriculture in 49 and 68 municipalities of the state, respectively; 13 of the 59 state aquifers presented a negative average availability, associated with 87.21% of the volume granted for agricultural use. The originality of this article resides in the fact that it is the long-term transdisciplinary result in which geographic and environmental statistical analysis techniques are used in an integral way to obtain indices of agricultural degradation in water and soil in the state of Sonora, contributing to the sustainable improvement of agriculture within the framework of the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals (2015).

The third work involves the action of the CPIs in which its intra- and inter-institutional content was evaluated as a case study through the transdisciplinary use of up- down/bottom-up organizational analysis and automated content tools. An intra (program and research projects) and inter (national problems) content system were based on a CPI as a case study from 2013-2022. Reliability and validity were established according to a system of heuristic rules and analysis of the similarity between groups of documents. Among the findings, as a theoretical contribution (Scientia), is developing an inter and intra-institutional content model based on up-down/bottom-up evaluation systems. In practice (Praxis), areas of opportunity were identified to improve the alignment and academic guidance processes. The transdisciplinary originality is based on the development of an innovative and transdisciplinary theoretical-methodological tool that integrated Mexican laws related to national problems, as well as programs and research projects of a CPI as a case study, structured and evaluated around organizational perspectives up -down/bottom-up and through massive document analysis. This achieves an evaluation system that improves the integration and sustainability of current academic evaluation systems. Content generation is an essential part of academic production in HEIs and CPIs, so it is essential to evaluate it.

The fourth work describes the health conditions, nutrition, and coping styles used by a group of women who work in manufacturing. Through a quasi-experimental design, 314 women with a mean age of 38 participated. Sociodemographic, health, nutrition, and coping with problems information was collected. Descriptive analysis, association indices, and hypothesis tests are included. A finding to highlight is that economic situations and problems with the couple are the ones that generate the most significant stress and the emotionally evasive coping style. The transdisciplinary originality lies in establishing that changing the most direct problem-solving styles will improve objective and subjective well-being. Age and working seniority are associated with a moderate physical and mental health state. It is suggested that a gender perspective be included as an analytical framework.

The following document elaborates on a community diagnosis in families in vulnerable areas of the state of Sonora. It determines how the factors of knowledge and use of the backyard garden are related to food consumption. A non-experimental cross-sectional design was used. From a non-probabilistic convenience sampling, 124 inhabitants participated. The results show that 30/124 people are of average height and weight. Having a garden at home generates differences in sugar consumption. The transdisciplinary originality involved the area of the social worker, the nutritional sciences, and the education necessary to innovate sustainable programs and tools for people in vulnerable contexts since it allows us to have an intervention from different axes, which has a comprehensive impact on the diagnostic stage. for the selection and design of measures of the community intervention project, through food and community gardens. It is concluded that the diagnosis guides us toward the need for nutritional education and the uses of family gardens.

The last article shows us state of the art in research on prolonged consumption circuits as a driving force behind agroecology in Mexico. Five databases were used to find articles published between 2017 and 2023 with keywords such as "long circuits of consumption" and "agroecology". Among the findings, a referential analysis was obtained on the relationship between long circuits and agroecology in the maize system in Mexico, highlighting a research gap. The transdisciplinary originality is based on determining how agroecology and long consumption circuits in agricultural production systems are states of the art. It is concluded that more research is needed on long circuits as a tool to boost the efficiency of agroecological systems on a commercial scale. The literature focuses mainly on short marketing circuits.

It is the wish of the authors and authorities of CIAD-CONAHCYT, as well as the management of AMIDI and the editorial board of the Scientia et PRAXIS scientific journal, who participated in this work, that readers find accessible and valuable information for their purposes in addition to encouraging them to be authors for future editions like this one, where the problems of our country and their possible solutions are exposed.