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Assessing food system vulnerabilities: a fault tree modeling approach

BACKGROUND: Food system function is vulnerable to disruption from a variety of sources. Disruption of the processes required for food provision may result in decreases in food security in affected communities. Currently, there are few tools that quantitatively predict or analyze food system vulnerab...

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Autores principales: Chodur, Gwen M., Zhao, Xilei, Biehl, Erin, Mitrani-Reiser, Judith, Neff, Roni
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2018
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6029429/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29970077
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-018-5563-x
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author Chodur, Gwen M.
Zhao, Xilei
Biehl, Erin
Mitrani-Reiser, Judith
Neff, Roni
author_facet Chodur, Gwen M.
Zhao, Xilei
Biehl, Erin
Mitrani-Reiser, Judith
Neff, Roni
author_sort Chodur, Gwen M.
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Food system function is vulnerable to disruption from a variety of sources. Disruption of the processes required for food provision may result in decreases in food security in affected communities. Currently, there are few tools that quantitatively predict or analyze food system vulnerabilities to contribute to food system resilience analysis. This work presents a prototype version of one such tool, a fault tree, which can be used conceptually and for future modeling work. Fault tree analysis is an engineering tool used to illustrate basic and intermediate factors that can cause overall system failures. METHODS: The fault tree defines food system functioning as food security at the community level and maps the components of the food system onto three main tenets of food security – accessibility, availability, and acceptability. Subtrees were populated using a top down approach guided by expertise, extant literature, and 36 stakeholder interviews. RESULTS: The food system is complex, requiring 12 subtrees to elaborate potential failures. Subtrees comprising accessibility include physical accessibility of the vending point and economic accessibility among community members. Food availability depends on the functioning of the food supply chain, or, in the case of individuals who rely on donated food, the food donation system. The food supply chain includes processing, wholesale operations, distribution systems, and retail center subtrees. Elements of acceptability include the medical appropriateness, nutritional adequacy, and cultural acceptability of food. Case studies of the effects of Winter Storm Jonas of 2016 and the 2013–2017 California drought in Baltimore City illustrate the utility of the fault tree model. CONCLUSION: FTA of potential routes to food system failure provides a tool that allows for consideration of the entirety of the food system; has potential to provide a quantitative assessment of food system failure and recovery; and is able to capture short-term and long-term hazards in a single framework. This systems modeling approach highlights an extensive list of vulnerability points throughout the food system, and underscores the message that reducing food system vulnerabilities requires action at all levels to protect communities from the risks of short-term and long-term threats to food security. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s12889-018-5563-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
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spelling pubmed-60294292018-07-09 Assessing food system vulnerabilities: a fault tree modeling approach Chodur, Gwen M. Zhao, Xilei Biehl, Erin Mitrani-Reiser, Judith Neff, Roni BMC Public Health Technical Advance BACKGROUND: Food system function is vulnerable to disruption from a variety of sources. Disruption of the processes required for food provision may result in decreases in food security in affected communities. Currently, there are few tools that quantitatively predict or analyze food system vulnerabilities to contribute to food system resilience analysis. This work presents a prototype version of one such tool, a fault tree, which can be used conceptually and for future modeling work. Fault tree analysis is an engineering tool used to illustrate basic and intermediate factors that can cause overall system failures. METHODS: The fault tree defines food system functioning as food security at the community level and maps the components of the food system onto three main tenets of food security – accessibility, availability, and acceptability. Subtrees were populated using a top down approach guided by expertise, extant literature, and 36 stakeholder interviews. RESULTS: The food system is complex, requiring 12 subtrees to elaborate potential failures. Subtrees comprising accessibility include physical accessibility of the vending point and economic accessibility among community members. Food availability depends on the functioning of the food supply chain, or, in the case of individuals who rely on donated food, the food donation system. The food supply chain includes processing, wholesale operations, distribution systems, and retail center subtrees. Elements of acceptability include the medical appropriateness, nutritional adequacy, and cultural acceptability of food. Case studies of the effects of Winter Storm Jonas of 2016 and the 2013–2017 California drought in Baltimore City illustrate the utility of the fault tree model. CONCLUSION: FTA of potential routes to food system failure provides a tool that allows for consideration of the entirety of the food system; has potential to provide a quantitative assessment of food system failure and recovery; and is able to capture short-term and long-term hazards in a single framework. This systems modeling approach highlights an extensive list of vulnerability points throughout the food system, and underscores the message that reducing food system vulnerabilities requires action at all levels to protect communities from the risks of short-term and long-term threats to food security. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1186/s12889-018-5563-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. BioMed Central 2018-07-03 /pmc/articles/PMC6029429/ /pubmed/29970077 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-018-5563-x Text en © The Author(s). 2018 Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.
spellingShingle Technical Advance
Chodur, Gwen M.
Zhao, Xilei
Biehl, Erin
Mitrani-Reiser, Judith
Neff, Roni
Assessing food system vulnerabilities: a fault tree modeling approach
title Assessing food system vulnerabilities: a fault tree modeling approach
title_full Assessing food system vulnerabilities: a fault tree modeling approach
title_fullStr Assessing food system vulnerabilities: a fault tree modeling approach
title_full_unstemmed Assessing food system vulnerabilities: a fault tree modeling approach
title_short Assessing food system vulnerabilities: a fault tree modeling approach
title_sort assessing food system vulnerabilities: a fault tree modeling approach
topic Technical Advance
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6029429/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29970077
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12889-018-5563-x
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