The University of Gastronomic Sciences (UNISG) would like to contribute as a partner to a project proposal focused on empowering sustainable food choices.
UNISG researchers can offer their interdisciplinary expertise that goes from food regulations and quality labeling to the sensory sciences, from cognitive neuroscience and neuromarketing to psychological and social sciences.
In particular, UNISG has expertise on food sensory evaluation, consumer science and individual differences in perception, and is contributing to many projects related to healthy dietary shifts towards sustainable and healthy foods.
Moreover, UNISG has experience on methodologies for ethical and fair communication, which allows consumers to know the products and make informed food choices.

The research activities of the University of Gastronomic Sciences aim at increasing knowledge and promoting innovation in the field of gastronomic studies.
UNISG boasts a research specialization focused on the multidisciplinary that characterizes the gastronomic context. Food is considered and presented not so much as a generic object of awareness, but as an instrument of privileged knowledge in the perspective of sustainability and food sovereignty. In this frame of reference, UNISG research is based on three interdisciplinary areas called: Environment, Perception and Quality, Mobility.
The Environment area analyzes the bidirectional relationship between man and the environment declined in the gastronomic field. In particular, on the one hand, it investigates the effect of the environment, of the ecological systems and of their changes on the gastronomic culture and on the alimentary behaviors. On the other hand, it studies the impact of socio-cultural systems and the agri-food production on the environment, on the territory and on the economic and natural resources. Particular attention is given to the analysis of the relationship between the urban and rural environment, the application of agro-ecology, the relationship between food and space and landscape, and the development of strategies for food sustainability.
The Perception and Quality area studies the socio-cultural, historical and environmental, physiological and genetic factors that influence the perception of food through an interdisciplinary method that takes into account different approaches: from the philosophical-aesthetic to the sensory sciences, from cognitive neuroscience and neuromarketing to psychological and social sciences. This area analyzes the quality of food, defining it in synchronic and diachronic perspective. Moreover, the Perception and Quality area intends to deepen the development of methodologies for ethical and fair communication, which allows consumers to know the products and make informed purchase choices.
The Mobility area is characterized by the study of the social and economic impacts of the movement of groups of people, goods – including ingredients and food -, capital, ideas and social imaginaries on culinary cultures, on food systems and on consumer choices and behaviors. In addition, the Mobility area analyzes cultural adaptations within the co-evolutionary processes that have given rise to the world’s gastronomy, including the eating habits that have characterized certain social contexts and the emerging consumer trends that characterize the current era.
UNISG is partner in several Horizon projects. Please find them on your website: https://www.unisg.it/en/academic-research/